Welcome to the reboot of Harrison Wells! The general consensus is that we (the audience and Team Flash “we”) are predisposed to dislike anyone with Harrison Wells’ handsome face. I mean, each character has their reasons for not trusting the man, and most of them involve some sort of — ahem–  murder-y business.. I mean, a guy shouldn’t be blamed for an alternate timeline which he was body snatched by an evil, time-traveling speedster, right? So, on paper, everyone should technically be like, “Hey, that wasn’t him. It was just his face! …His good looking, striking face. Let’s give him a chance to be a nice guy.”

But humans (specifically nerds) are fickle, stubborn creatures.

“I’m my own man,” Earth-2 Harry Wells tells the team, and Barry looks at him thoughtfully. Funny how Barry is the first to give this man a chance; I seem to have been wrong about this season’s Barry being angsty and untrusting… the season premiere was just a slight character roadblock in his optimism and positivity, but the Flash is back and sunshine-y as ever. Papa Joe even shoots at Harry, and Barry saves him in my favorite sequence of the episode. He’s used this moved before to protect Arrow from Captain Boomerang;  I love it when he spins to protect people from projectiles. Like a Protection Projectile Pirouette.

Hold up: let’s get to Harry Wells’ backstory first. On Earth-2, he is the creator of S.T.A.R. Labs, meta-human detecting wrist technology, a teenage daughter (!!!)…and Zoom (according to Jay Garrick). No seriously. Jay Flash-crashes Wells’ Steve Jobs-esque presentation and outs Wells as the creator of Zoom and all meta-humans. Really? How?

Jay once told Caitlin that he was turned into The Flash in an accident similar to Barry’s… was that before, after, or during the creation of other meta-humans? Did Harry Wells purposefully create Zoom after The Flash was a prominent figure so that Zoom was merely a S.T.A.R. Labs creation inspired by the Scarlett Speedster gone wrong or did the Speedforce choose Jay as a means to stop Zoom? I’m confusing myself.

In the Earth-2 flashback, Jay implies that Wells kept Earth-2’s particle accelerator accident a secret; Jay’s been doing his research and traced the dark matter radiation to Wells’ labs. They do not have a good relationship: lots of shade is publicly thrown as Jay demands Wells to own up to his mistakes and Wells casually suggests that Jay “do your f*cking job you only have one job so run away and just finish off Zoom seriously.” They do not like each other.

“The last time we listened to a guy with your face, some bad things went down.”

— Cisco Ramon, aka Vibe

Alright, back to our Bullet-Stopping Barry… BSB? No. Nevermind.

Something I noticed in favor of Harry Wells is that he raised his arms when Joe came in and pointed his gun at him. Wells seems genuinely shaken up that he was almost shot.

Joe is the one to break the news to Iris that Earth-2 Wells is a thing she should be concerned with, being one of the only people, I assume, who knows that she is still really effed up about Eddie’s death. I’m not saying that Barry or the others don’t know this, but Iris has definitely been putting up a front about how “okay” and “fine” she is. That’s what our Iris does. My bb. Now she’s my bb with a gun because Papa Joe insists that she’s gonna need it.

(Spoiler alert: she does, but not against Harry Wells.)

Barry and Cisco go on a man-date to talk things out over a cup of coffee at Jitters. Patty Spivot falls in line behind them, and Cisco witnesses Barry fumble his way out of asking Patty out on a date. It’s very bad. But it’s also very Barry.

Cisco tries to show him “how it’s done” by asking out the new beautiful barista. She is so gorgeous and majestic… like a glorious bird. Like a hawk. (I like that Barry is always there when Cisco is trying to ask a woman out. His background facials as he observes are the best).

The mysterious barista shuts Cisco down, and Barry pouts for his best friend. The aforementioned best friend starts vibing and envisions an Earth-2 meta-human robbing a bank. Ever the homie, Barry pats Cisco’s back during his vision and consoles him that it’s her loss. I laughed way too hard.

“NO, BARRY, I’M NOT SAD ABOUT THE GIRL A BANK IS BEING ROBBED GO BRO GO!”

Breacher/Meta of the Week: Doctor Light

The masked bankrobber has the ability to derive power from starlight. Harry Wells explains that she’s only a small-time thief, and it wouldn’t be a problem to capture her as bait to lure Zoom to them. Damn, Harry. He’s pretty single-minded about getting his hooks into Zoom? Is this really because he wants to right his wrongs… or does Zoom have something/someone very important to him?

Jay Garrick walks into the lab like a southern lawyer. “I OBJECT!” Jay cries. They really do not like each other.

Turns out, Doctor Light is trying to steal enough cash to go on the run (ironically) from Zoom. Flash!Barry tries to talk to her (because Jay insists that Light can be reasoned with), and Light seems almost down to hear him out.

When she demasks, however, Barry is surprised to see Linda Park’s Earth-2 doppelganger is the breacher. She freaks out when Flash!Barry says her name and flee is a burst of starlight. Now Barry can’t see. He is Daredevil.

Doctor Light finds Prime-Linda at the CCPN office; she wants to kill her and live as her counterpart. Light kills the CCPN Chief — undoubtedly her first kill — and Iris shoots her with the gun that her dad gave her. Light isn’t harmed, but she is unmasked. Linda and Iris are the only witnesses to Light’s face; I guess Linda is on the cusp of officially joining Team Flash.

Barry the Blind

Okay, this is where the ridiculous seeps in to the story, but I love this kind of ridiculous. Barry is blind and in denial: he wants to stakeout Linda, he wants to have face-to-face conversations despite not knowing he’s talking to a wall, and he wants to go on his first date with Patty. RIDICULOUS SHIT. It’s why I love this show: if you’ve ever asked the question “What if Barry went blind? How would he deal?” you can now watch your official answer. That answer is “not very well and in an almost-sitcom, romantic comedy manner.”

This actually happens, I kid you not: Barry wears sunglasses that are probably Grant Gustin’s to his first date with Patty while Cisco feeds him visual information through an earpiece.

I think I’ve read this fanfic before.

Oh, the Flarrowverse and its earpiece humor. Pure gold.

Sidenote: My boy Cisco really needs a date. I mean, I get that this would be fun for him, but I’d like to see Cisco on the date and Barry/Caitlin wingmanning him through the comms. Plus, he seems WAY TOO EXCITED to be “creepin’ and peepin’” in on this Barry/Patty date.

Speed Mirage: Things are not as they appear

Our Second Earth-ers, Jay and Harry, full on brawl in S.T.A.R. Labs; Barry lets them each get in a few hits before separating them.

(I can’t be the only one imagining Barry Allen doing the same thing between squabbling Justice League members in the future, right? I’m getting emotional just picturing it.)

So far, we’ve been blind to the biggest secrets of these two men, but as tensions run high, it hit me why each man is so troubled with Zoom. I think Jay is right in questioning Harry’s motives. There is something big at stake Harry’s not telling them about: his daughter is Zoom’s prisoner. Harry seems like a bad guy with a dick-ish attitude and a gravellydick-ish voice, but I think he’s doing all of this for his family. Jay is hiding his own secrets as well; Earth-2’s Flash is tremendously insecure. He’s nearly died from Zoom so many times, I don’t think Jay actually believes that they can beat Zoom.

Cisco’s big meta-human secret is outed to the team by Wells through the use of his Earth-2 meta-sensors. He goes down the line of Team Flash one-by-one. I hold my breath as he passes Caitlin Snow.

She does not set off the sensor. Cisco looks like a guilty puppy when he sets off the sensor. C’mon, Harry, not a good way to get on Cisco’s good side.

Harry not-so-gently coaxes Cisco into locating Doctor Light using his abilities. Intensity is a key feature of Earth-2 personalities. Even Barry semi-breaks character and lets out a Gustin “Yo…”

At the train station where Light is trying to escape, Flash appears. It’s a crowded station, and he is fully decked out in uniform. He basically yells, “SCATTER!” and all of the Central citizens scream and run. I know I shouldn’t laugh, but I do.

Jay is at a loss for how to beat Light, but Harry Wells steps in and tell him to run so fast that he creates after-images of himself to confuse Light. Does this technique sound familiar? It’s how Thawne-Wells duped the team before when they didn’t know he was the reverse Flash. Harry’s knowledge of this speedster technique makes Cisco uncomfortable. That’s one more point for the This-Dude-Is-Not-Good side.

Oh, the Speed Mirage works.

Barry has a newfound trust in Harry Wells after his advice. Barry makes the executive decision to keep the captured Doctor Light in the pipeline and lure Zoom into the lab. With this decree, Jay resigns from the team. No really, he legitimately gives a resignation speech and leaves. It’s very sad. Caitlin is sad.

Snowbarisco celebrates with some Flash Lattes served by the beautiful barista who previously turned Cisco down. She explains that she was caught off guard last time — she needs to be more vigilant… like a bird soaring the skies —  and gives Cisco another chance. She introduces herself as Kendra Saunders.

They sit and smile while sipping their lattes. Cisco real talks about his abilities, so Barry and Caitlin cheer him up with the suggestion of a cool new name.

As territorial as Cisco gets about naming meta-humans, he lets his two best friends choose his alter ego: Vibe.

Apparently, Wells learns that Jitters is the “It Spot” for coffee and halts outside the glass door when he sees the camaraderie of Snowbarisco. Unlike previous “Harrison Wells” tags, there’s nothing ominous about him watching the three Lab friends. Instead, it feels more Adele-ish. “HELLO FROM THE OUTSIIIIDE,” he sings possibly wondering if they’ll ever trust him.

Super-Quick Things:

• ParkWest is very real. Are they seriously drinking in the office? They’re going to be such good sisters-in-law when Wally West officially enters the picture.
• Linda Park calls out a football star who beats his wife and makes no apologies. She is respected by Iris and her (now-dead) Editor-In-Chief. I love Linda.
• Cisco does not think Time Travel would be as cool as Patty thinks.
• “Dr. Wells the Sequel” — Barry Allen

• Cisco’s best line of the episode (it was tough to choose):

• Iris learning about Barry’s date with Patty… sounds familiar?

• Barry’s persona when talking to “bad guys” has increased in punniness. “Let’s take it down a few lumen.”
• Barrick aka Jay/Barry:

• When Barry says “Thank you” to the waiter that already left their table.
• Why does the team keep using their S.T.A.R. Labs van for stakeouts? It’s not at all inconspicuous.
• Patty figuring out that Barry is blind before he tells her is some major foreshadowing that Patty is going to find out Barry’s bigger secret before he decides to tell her.
• “Optimism must be an Earth-1 thing.”
• This little berry.

• Jay Garrick’s best friend is freaking Aquaman. And he’s from Atlantis. Holy crap.

• Note to Christelle: never lose this gif…

• Harry Wells keeps warning the team that people under the influence of Zoom are unreasonable… he seems to be speaking from experience. I want to trust him, but a small part of me can’t. Not yet.

Thanks for reading! May the speedforce be with you.

With each passing week, I’m becoming more and more impressed with Supergirl as a series. Sure, the pilot was already strong, but last week’s episode definitely raised the bar. Now with episode three in the can, the sky’s the limit for Supergirl to blaze its own trail. It’s just too bad the ratings are not keeping pace with the quality of the series. Come on, America! Tune in because this show could use your eyeballs!

The episode, “Fight or Flight,” picks up right after the events of last week. Kara has taken Cat to a secluded area (in Los Angeles, apparently) to do her interview. Immediately, Cat is bored with the proceedings because Kara’s story is basically a carbon copy of Superman’s: Krypton, flying, yadda yadda.

The interview goes from bad to worse because Cat has figured out how to push Supergirl’s buttons. In addition to comparing her to Superman, she asks Kara why she hasn’t started a family. Offended by the sexist question, Kara cuts the interview short and flies away, but not before letting it slip that she and Superman are not only Kryptonians, but they’re family.

The next day, Kara and Alex are having coffee and cinnamon buns at a local coffee shop when James comes in. Alex can immediately see that Kara is crushing on him. She then chides her sister again about her not-so-secret identity. And I keep asking myself why Alex isn’t concerned about the 50 or so DEO agents WHO ALL KNOW KARA IS SUPERGIRL.

Of course, it doesn’t help that Cat has gone public with her news about Kara’s family ties. The news is so big that Cat is writing an exclusive expose and tasks Kara with organizing a launch party for the new Supergirl-centric magazine. The show continues its anti-ginger prejudice when Cat gets poor Dave removed from the premises because she finds his hair “distracting.”

Meanwhile, this episode’s Alien Threat of the Week is introduced, and we eventually learn he’s not an alien at all. In fact, Kara is actually forbidden from involving herself from non-alien threats. Or at least that’s what Henshaw and the DEO think.

This time the DC villain Reactron is up to bat and interestingly, he was originally conceived as a Supergirl/Power Girl villain. So it’s nice that the show is featuring someone from Kara’s rogues gallery and doesn’t have to crib from someone else — like coughArrowcough.

He makes himself known after Supergirl rescues a driver from a fatal bus crash. Even though Reactron is not an alien, his power level is high enough to go toe to toe with a Kryptonian. He’s even battled Superman himself to a number of standstills, so this bad guy’s no joke.

Though Kara gets roughed up a great deal in their initial encounter, she is able to damage Reactron’s containment suit before the villain flees.

Because Reactron isn’t an alien, Henshaw recommends that Kara call in her cousin to take care of the threat, and we realize that the episode’s running theme will be that people keep unfairly contrasting Kara to Superman.

Back at CatCo, Winn — adorably — shows James and Kara a secret office in the building that the #SuperFriends will use for their Superhero Sleuthing going forward.

The three of them use Winn’s tech to track Reactron, and James spends the whole time humblebragging about his Best Pal Superman while also telling Kara to stand down since this bad guy might be too much for her. As James and Kara argue, James lets slip that Clark is Superman, and Winn’s reaction is magic. Seriously, Jeremy Jordan’s performance in this scene — hell, this whole episode — has made me officially Team Winn.

Meanwhile, Kara is tired of being in the shadow of Superman’s cape — something Jimmy should be familiar with based on what he said last episode. And the first cracks in their relationship — Kammy? Jara? Portmanteaus are dumb — begin to show.

Elsewhere, at Lord Technologies, we get our first real taste of Peter Facinelli’s Maxwell Lord. He plays the part with just enough dickishness that you don’t quite want him to have his neck snapped by Wonder Woman, just yet. Besides, I can totally see Maxwell Lord palling around with Micheal Rosenbaum’s Lex Luthor (BECAUSE SMALLVILLE IS CANON!).

After droning on about a new maglev train (and firing one of his engineers), Reactron shows up and kidnaps the CEO because he needs his suit fixed. Who built the original, I wonder?

Supergirl investigates, without DEO approval, but her sister offers unsanctioned help to the Superfriends by figuring out Reactron’s origin story. Turns out Reactron is really a nuclear engineer named Benjamin Krull who gained his powers when terrorists tried to hijack the facility where he worked with his wife.

Though Superman saved the day, the ensuing radiation blast killed Krull’s wife and transformed him into a vengeance-seeking killing machine. That’s why he’s got a hard on to kill Superman and everything he loves. So since Superman took away someone he loved, Reactron feels that turnabout is fair play and will take out the only person who has a connection to Superman: Supergirl.

Armed with this knowledge, Kara wants to seek out Reactron and reason with him to give up Lord and come away peacefully. James doesn’t think she should go after Reactron, but she ignores the advice and finds the bad guy in an abandoned junk yard.

After freeing Lord from his shackles, she tells him to run away before a nuclear blast sends her backwards. After some more (poorly choreographed) fisticuffs — seriously, they need to get the Arrow or Flash folks on here for fight choreo — Reactron gets the upper hand and Kara’s down for the count. Just as he’s about to go for the finisher on her…

OHMYGODITSFUCKINGSUPERMANSAVINGTHEDAY!!!!!!!!

Sadly, Supes isn’t sporting the red trunks (boo!) and we may never know who’s playing the Man of Steel.

I know the whole point of the episode is to quell our expectations and to accept Supergirl for Supergirl, but seeing Superman actually on the show was still thrilling. And really, it’s kind of smart of the writers to address the Superman question in this way. I know one of the things that’s been swirling around the show’s premise is how weird it is that Superman isn’t around. Now we know, but we’ll get to that later.

After the commercials, Kara wakes up in her apartment with Alex and James. She’s been out for hours and Superman has flown off to save the day elsewhere. When she asks how Clark knew to rescue her, James confesses that he signaled the Big Guy because HE HAS A SIGNAL WATCH Y’ALL!!!

On TV, Maxwell Lord thanks Superman for saving his ass, and Kara is pissed. First Jimmy, now this? Fucking men.

James leaves the apartment knowing he might have just screwed things up for their relationship. Kara realizes she’s late for Cat’s party and doesn’t have anything to wear. Fortunately, Alex borrowed a party dress from the DEO’s closets.

Also, why the hell does the DEO keep party dresses in the closet?

At the party, Cat and Maxwell have some flirty banter on the dance floor. Kara arrives solo and is chided by Cat before Winn (in a bowtie!) makes the save. The two longtime friends share a dance clearly designed to manufacture Winn/Kara shippers (is there such a thing?) and activate my musical Berlanti-verse crossover dream.

Then James — not in a bowtie, but wearing a suit three sizes too small — cuts in and apologizes for not believing in Kara.

Before the two of them kiss, Reactron crashes through the ceiling, looking for Supergirl. Kara sneaks out of the party and “secretly” changes into her Supersuit (guess she had to speed back to the apartment first because it clearly wasn’t under her dress) and saves Maxwell Lord from Reactron again.

Kara has to break away from her battle with the villain when a column is about to fall on top of Winn. Seizing the moment, James taunts Reactron to come after him. Alex — who has convinced Cyborg Homeland to help her — feeds Kara instructions on how to defeat Reactron once and for all. She needs to remove the Arc Reactor from his Iron Man suit. The problem is that doing so will cause a nuclear meltdown that will turn National into a mushroom cloud unless she coats the core in lead. Fortunately, the museum has a lead sculpture on display that Kara proceeds to meltdown. Hope CatCo has a good insurance policy!

Now that James has led Reactron outside and get the danger away from the people — what a good idea, Zack Snyder — Kara is able to come in and finish off the villain. With her right hand encased in lead, she rips out the reactor and saves Jimmy and the city!

I bet they hug when the camera cuts away. Though, I’m a little worried for James being so close to the NUCLEAR REACTOR IN KARA’S HAND. After the authorities cart Reactron away, Kara thanks Henshaw and her sister for the assist. Alex convinces Kara to ask Jimmy out, and she agrees. The problem is that when Kara shows up at Jimmy’s door, he has a visitor from Metropolis. Lucy Lane has shown up in National City, and apparently, she’s James’ ex. Awkward.

A dejected Kara goes back to her desk to sulk. She even dismisses Winn’s suggestion to do some superheroing when an IM ding pops up on her laptop. And the most important text messages sequence in superhero cinema happens. And it’s brilliant.

BTW, in my head, this is what the other end of the chat looks like:

Seriously though, can every episode end in Kara and Clark texting each other? Though I hope they’re chatting on, like, a Wayne Technologies platform. Because if they’re using LexCorp or LordTech software, Clark totally just revealed their secret identities to the whole world.

Full disclaimer: I didn’t watch Constantine on NBC. Sorry! But even without knowledge of the character or the show, I enjoyed this crossover (is it still a crossover when one of the crossed shows is cancelled?). John Constantine and Oliver had great bro-chemistry and the little bits of interaction he had with the rest of Team Arrow were great as well. 10/10, would enjoy again.

As my recap subtitle tells us, we deal with the restoration of Sara’s soul to her body. Psalm 23, where the title derives, relates to Arrow in ways you wouldn’t expect.

The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” ‭‭– Psalms‬ ‭23:2-3‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Star City certainly is a valley of the shadow of death right now. Oh, and Other Realm/soul!Sara was found by water (or magic hot tub, close enough). Re-ensouled Sara is probably gonna be looking for her “paths of righteousness,” leading her to Legends of Tomorrow.

This episode, for me, was basically the re-ensoul Angel arc from Angel season four, especially with the magical crossover and dream sequence.

Constant-ly Confounding

In order to bring us John Constantine in the present day, we learn that Oliver met him on the island five years ago. Lian Yu is a nexus that draws in bad people. (Clearly). I loved Constantine’s command of every situation he’s in. He immediately knows there’s something more to Oliver, he’s quick to shoot out the tires, and he only nearly dies when Oliver saves him in the cave. I can see why his confidence is appealing. I can’t say I’d watch it as a TV show still (sorry!), but I definitely would like more appearances on Arrow. It was a perfect fit. (Unlike The Flash, where it wouldn’t be. Like how Supergirl would fit perfectly in a Flash crossover, but less so on Arrow. But basically: GIVE ME ALL THE CROSSOVERS.)

I wonder if we’ll see what Constantine took later. I must say, it reminds me of a Sailor Moon wand.

Well, until John lops off the ball of the Orb of … something. (My captions didn’t come on for the DVR replay.) But the staff is a spell book that he’s gonna tuck away for safekeeping.

Before he goes, Constantine takes the tattoo from his arm and places it (MAGICALLYYYY) onto Oliver’s stomach, giving us another tattoo origin! It’s supposed to protect Oliver from his current island nemeses, but I guess it worked for longer? Since Oliver didn’t die last season when he totally should have. All in all, this was definitely the most interesting the flashbacks have been in ages.

In the present, Oliver calls Constantine to get him to help with Sara. Now how did John know it was Oliver calling? He had that particular number stored in his phone?! Or has really great caller ID from what’s probably a burner phone that gets recycled every so often. A number that’s probably new-ish — if not from the last six months, with Oliver retiring and coming back, then from the last five years — because island Oliver didn’t even have a phone to exchange numbers… So clearly they’ve met since…! MORE CROSSOVERS OFFICIALLY HAVE TO HAPPEN.

Who else missed this reference the first time around?

Brilliant Take That to NBC.

Constantine pulls some magical mojo so they can go to the Other Realm to get Sara’s soul back.There, they have to fight… soul protecting league of shadows looking dudes…? I think we lost all plot logic here, but I almost don’t care. I say almost because, while Constantine fights the Boss of the level, Oliver and Laurel are supposed to help Soul!Sara out of the hot tub. But even after John says “anytime today would be nice,” THEY STAND THERE AND WATCH HIM FIGHT WHILE SOUL!SARA DROWNS A LITTLE. Uhm, guys! GET A MOVE ON!

They get Sara back (yay!) and Oliver walks his new bro out, telling him that Damien’s in town. Constantine doesn’t like that and tells them to basically run. And then he dips because he ain’t got time to mess with Damien Darhk, apparently. This is probably not the last time we see him though, so see ya later, John!

Canaries Fly Again

We know from last week that Sara escaped from being kept in a dank, dirty basement, but it wasn’t just to find a comfy sofa. At first, it seemed like she was back to her early-Canary days — saving women from violent attacks, but then it becomes clear that Sara is looking for Thea. Seeing as how Thea killed her, this definitely makes sense. (But if Sara and Thea have a Pit connection, why did Sara not sense her earlier? She was looking for her in Thea-type places but places Thea hadn’t been to, but then suddenly she has a connection to her? Most Arrow plot holes are ignorable, but this one bothered me upon my rewatch.)

What’s happening with Sara isn’t healing anyone’s pain. It’s making it worse.”

Well, until they get her soul back…

This usually ends up being the problem with any supernatural/superhero show: audiences can’t take the stakes of death seriously because there are usually ways to get people back. The Pit has cheapened anyone’s death, but I think the show is at least trying to make it seem harder than just a bubble bath and a snap of the fingers. We have yet to see how re-ensouled Sara is mentally, but we have to assume she’s alright if she’s gonna be saving the world on Legends of Tomorrow.

(We also know she goes off to be with the Legends, so she chooses not to stay in Star City with her sister and father.) But it’s taken three episodes and a fantastically timed crossover to get her back. We don’t want Tommy and/or Moira to deal with this do we? Or whoever is in the grave at the end of 4×01¹? The Pit may be a Get Out of Death Free card, but I also don’t think the characters will choose to go through this route again. If they do, something worse is going to happen.

He’s Got Terrific Energy

Someone pointed out to me that Curtis’ gym clothes are reminiscent of his Mr. Terrific outfit, which is a cool Easter egg. Curtis tells Felicity that he is a bronze medal decathlete, tying in Mr. Terrific’s Olympic strength. Just like most of the heroes on this show, we are on Curtis’ journey with him as he becomes Mr. Terrific, but a lot of the skills necessary, he already has.

I saw some reaction on Twitter about Felicity giving Curtis a job she could clearly do herself, which made some people uneasy. A few things here:

1. Felicity is hella busy. She’s a CEO and the Team Arrow overlord! Plus some Oliver campaign stuff too probz. Give it to Curtis and he can take care of it while she does other stuff!
2. Maybe there’s some tech on there that Curtis and his equipment can handle faster than hers (are the Arrow cave computers still glitching like they were last week?).
3. She clearly just wants to work with Curtis, get to know him more, see what he can do. Test his skills a bit, but also place her trust in him. The more she gives him and he proves he can handle it, the more she can come to him with Team Arrow stuff.
4. I bet cleaning up that audio would require her to listen to Ray’s “last” words over and over and over again. Who has the energy for that? Especially when you can get someone you trust to do it.

I like their dynamic and don’t think it’s taking away from Felicity to provide more Terrific Smoak time.

Anyway, Curtis clears up the message and they learn that RAY IS ALIVE. DUH! Next week is clearly Terrific Smoakin’ ATOM time!

Furhther in the Darhk

Damien asks Captain Lance to delete some files from a massive server. Since he’s working undercover for Oliver, he takes the information to him. Oliver sends Diggle with Lance and they figure out that he’s deleting names — the names of former H.I.V.E. members? Or just assassin hits? — including Andrew Diggle.

According to Darhk, Andy got himself involved in drugs, weapons, murder over in Afghanistan, so H.I.V.E. had him killed. His story doesn’t quite make sense, especially since:

1. We saw Andrew bodyguarding with Diggle when Oliver came to Starling during the flashbacks last season. Was he a crime lord then?
2. Why would H.I.V.E. care about Andy being a crime lord? Was he trying to edge in on their turf?
3. How did Diggle not suspect anything about his brother. Or was he just willfully blind?
4. If the answer is coming from Damien, put little trust in it.

Diggle gets Andy’s file in the end, but we don’t get to see it. Hopefully this gets explained soon, because Darhk’s explanation wasn’t an explanation at all. Though I did like how confused he was that Lance was asking about him. More villains need to question when their henchmen start asking random questions. Hope Lance didn’t blow his cover…

Anti-Canary Campaign?

We already knew Oliver wouldn’t abandon his friendship/partnership with Laurel in order to run for Mayor. While I am solidly an Olicity shipper, I do root for CanArrow as a crime fighting partnership. Laurel just needs to get her life together, learn to process grief, and acknowledge that her mistakes are mistakes and that maybe she shouldn’t have done them.

“If I have a judgmental look on my face, it’s because you played with forces you do not understand. And now people are dying because of it.”

Laurel never really acknowledges the consequences of her actions beyond her immediate family. She even berates Oliver for not caring about the Lances. Oliver deserves to be yelled — a lot — but that was an unfair and low blow. He’s always trying to keep Lances safe, always trying to undo his damage from the boat accident. And just because Oliver lied, doesn’t mean that it’s okay for you to do the same, Laurel! Two wrongs and all that jazz.

I did enjoy that the scene acknowledges that Oliver doesn’t take Laurel seriously (few of us do, lol oops), but it’s true that he really hasn’t trained her or given her much of a chance to grow as the Black Canary, which is the only way in which Laurel’s speech rings with any truth. He hasn’t trained her, so he’s been stifling her ability to actually do well in the field. Once he does, will we see better Black Canary moves?

Flechettes:

• Spot the Hamilton reference in this recap.
• It’s weird seeing flashback Ollie with the short hair use his really high, still kind of naive, pre-return voice. Mostly because of the short hair. But I DON’T miss the wig!

• “Are you sure it’s just because it’s a dying declaration from your ex? I mean, that is some serious Nicholas Sparks stuff. Don’t judge, the man can write emotion.” I love your depths, Curtis.
• “Are you sticking around for a cupcake or something?” Damien’s villainy really is delicious. (<– that pun wasn’t on purpose, I swear!) He hasn’t quite done anything major yet (aside from killing city leadership, his efforts have been small scale) and we don’t really have an eye on what his end prize might be… just hints and suspicious packages. But his scenes with Lance are wonderful, the two men play off of each other really well. I’m so scared to see what his endgame might be! Never forget that R’as wanted him dead the minute he heard he was in Starling City.
• “What do you want?” “A new beginning for the world. A nice glass of Merlot, not necessarily in that order.” So while the last few villains have had it out for Oliver/Starling City in particular, can we expect Damien’s evil plans to be more world domination based?

• We got several shout outs to past season arcs and characters. TOMMY REFERENCE OMG! Also to Moira, and those three episodes Thea worked at CNRI….
• “This is your overlord, Felicity Smoak.” “We have a PA system?” “Yet another decision I might live to regret.” I DON’T. Felicity installed that PA system 99% so she could say that. Love her. But also, how big is this new Arrow Cave that they need a PA system?!
• Also, the new Arrow Cave has a garage? For their cars/bikes? Lance drove into it and I assume we’ll see motorcycle Team Arrow speed out from it. But where is it in relation to the campaign offices above??
• I really liked Thea’s door move on the stairwell. I hope to never find myself in a chase, but that’s a good fake out move.
• How many windows did Sara break through this episode? I lost count. More work for Star City Window Treatment services.

• Shouldn’t the first thing you do when stealing an ancient artifact be to look for traps?! Did Indiana Jones and Aladdin teach us NOTHING!?
• I love how Other Realm Oliver and Laurel are immediately in their gear. Constantine knew what to bring.

• “I’m not going to just stand here!” Laurel doesn’t hesitate, she takes and she takes… (Couldn’t resist.)
• The musical motif’s Constantine brought with him are fantastic.
• “He’s a very specific kind of yummy…!” “Oh, I’m gonna pretend I didn’t hear you just say that.” Like I said in a previous recap, I like that we get lighter Oliver again, who can joke with his sister and his team again. That was severely lacking in season 3 and helped tank it.
• Guys, Oliver says ‘I’m sorry’ for something! OH EM GEE! I think he’s finally growing as a person! Whaaaaat!?

That’s all I’m gonna write now, because this is a week late. Byyyeee!

Felicity hasn’t showered in a week, Sara woke up from her soul coma, and Ray returns in this week’s Arrow, “Lost Souls.” As we’ve discussed before, most of this season of Arrow (and somewhat The Flash) has been set up for Legends of Tomorrow. I don’t have a problem with this because it’s been moving our characters forward all season (as we see especially this week with Olicity), but I wondered today what would happen to the season when they don’t have Legends to work towards. But that’s a question for another day. Let’s base jump into this thing like Curtis and Felicity!

In Which Felicity Needs to Take A Break

Ever since Felicity heard Ray’s distress signal, she’s been locked into her chair at Palmer Tech trying to find him and get him out. So much so that everyone around her slowly trying to push her towards the shower/bathroom she probably has in her office somewhere. She’s not taking kindly to everyone not letting her just find Ray RIGHT NOW (wait for it, Felicity. Just wait for it. I know you don’t hesitate. You take and you take, but Damien doesn’t discriminate, between the sinners and the saints… “I have waiting and seeing, I have to do something.” Okay, I’ll stop).  She hasn’t slept, she’s a bit cranky, and she feels like this is all her fault. If she hadn’t left with Oliver six months ago, she might have gotten Ray’s distress call. Stupid boys! Also, Oliver calls her mother! Ugh!

(It’s kinda cute that Oliver and Donna text. Oliver hasn’t had a nagging mother in his life in two years and he misses it. It probably brings him as much joy as Felicity does. In ways that work best at a distance. LOL)

Round of applause for Felicity’s snark this week!

• “Have you magically learned to code in the last 72 hours?”
• “I’ll come with you.” “Why are you gonna build the thing?”
• “The Green Arrow’s gonna be kicking some ass tonight!” “If I don’t kick his first!”
• “You’ve faced down Mirakuru soilders and the League of Assassins. Are you honestly telling me you couldn’t say no to my mom?”
• “Chatty Cathy, you’re up. Your new codename. The only one I could think of to use in polite company.”
• “This is the same level of delusion that would make you think that my mother coming to town would make me feel better.”

Not snarky but:

• “I’m not sure our company health plan covers supernatural dismemberment.”

The honeymoon haze begins to lift from Felicity’s eyes and she realizes that she’s been so lost in Oliver, that she’s dropped the ball on other aspects of her life. This doesn’t feel that true, especially since they’ve been back to town. I think it’s mostly just delayed guilt over Ray’s death that she hadn’t processed and is finally coming to the forefront. She isn’t in — Ivytown, was it? — anymore. She’s running a company, helping Team Arrow as a whole, and helping a man become elected Mayor. That’s a lot and some of it connected to Oliver because he’s her boyfriend, but some she would have been doing even before that.

But Felicity gets over her guilt and her annoyance at Oliver and they, as Felicity’s MOTHER suggest, have what is presumably fantastic make up sex. Upside down Spider-Man kisses and all.

What we’re all wondering now is: how long until Felicity is kidnapped by Darhk and what will Oliver do to get her back?

Also, did they blow the Felicity/Damien connection by having him not lay any claim to having heard of her before? (And she’s seen him around town, with no recognition.) Obviously, he could be lying. And if he IS her dad, why would he want to be close to her after all this time? Is kidnapping her a ruse to get to “know” her? Or is he really not connected to her at all? I can’t help but think that with Donna Smoak in town, mentioning Felicity’s paternal abandonment, and sticking around, it seems, Felicity’s father reveal must be around the corner. Otherwise, it’s all a redherring. If it is, the real twist better be more delicious than Damien Darhk kidnapping his own daughter and getting the Green Arrow to come after him. OR, even BETTER: Felicity getting herself out of that situation. In the words of Spartan:

“Felicity Smoak is one of the smartest, most badass women on the planet.”

I’m a General, Wheee!

Curtis gets his first true introduction to Team Arrow this week and it is awesome! But first, he meets Oliver Queen and immediately tries to figure out if he’s The Green Arrow.

That mask must have a perception filter on it (thanks, Cisco?), because Curtis says “Jaw’s not right.” So OF COURSE the next logical step is to get Curtis on the Team. When they need to break into Kord Industries (we ever gonna see the CEO tho?), Curtis offers to help get Felicity in, while Oliver gets knocked out on purpose and Diggle gets the rest of the team in. I’m really glad to see Curtis in the field, using his skills slowly to help save the day. Also, his excitement was so fun to watch. That whooo as they jumped! Curtis is totally an adrenaline junkie. He’s only gonna want more after this. Can’t wait for more Terrific Smoak adventures!

That’s That Little Guy Who Spoke to Me

So Ray fell into a construction site and then… what? How did he end up with Damien? Did Damien feed him? I gave Ray a lot of crap last season, and it was all because the writers didn’t appropriately handle  — or acknowledge — that his advances towards Felicity were more on the creepy than romantic side. Without that angle, Ray is much better, even if he’d rather talk about bugs than people. Though, I must say that it was hilarious to think about the fact that Ray has been tiny and talking to bugs all this time, so once he’s around people. he can’t stop talking in his excitement. What’s next for you Ray? How do we get from here to Legends? I have no doubt the next few episodes will tell us.

I Got My Right Hand Man Back

Diggle and Ollie’s bro scenes are a sight for sore eyes! I love that Diggle is once again the voice of reason, both for Felicity when she’s freaking out about hating stagnation, and for Oliver when he needs a friend to help guide him through Olicity troubles. And once again Oliver proves that he’s growing as a person (GASP) and he listens to Diggle’s advice?! What?! Is this secretly emotionally mature Earth 3 Ollie? (Earth-2 Ollie is “dead” according to this week’s The Flash.)

Diggle and Oliver share a drink (we’ve upgraded from vodka, to whiskey) and Oliver remains grounded. More scenes like this please!

(That Diggle/Oliver point. Warms my heart.)

“You good?” “Better. Thank you.”

And Oliver learned to say thank you?! BLESS.

Teach ‘Em How to Say Goodbye

Sara’s been home for about a day — I don’t count her post re-ensoulment nap time — and she already is ready to leave home. At least she tells her mom, River Song. Anyone, especially those in her family, who expected Sara to stick around, really don’t know her very well. Sara’s been running her whole life. She left with Ollie on the boat, she ran away from the League of Assassins, ran away from home to go BACK to the League, and here she is again, needing to find herself now that she’s alive again. It’s a wonder anyone ever misses her when she dies, she’s hardly ever around. (Was that too harsh? I dunno. I like Sara, but Laurel put in a lot of effort and stupid points to get her back and then she just bolts. If Legends of Tomorrow weren’t a thing, I’d totally have more side eye at Sara. But we know she’s got places to be.)

So Sara decides she’s kicking it to the curb and heading to Central City. Hopefully she doesn’t kill any more people there.

(WAIT. WAS DINAH LANCE THE FORMER IN CENTRAL WHEN THE WAVE HIT? Could she have metapowers?! Powers to travel in time, for instance?! Maybe make things bigger on the inside?! Either way, there should be a webseries of Alex Kingston and Caity Lotz in Central where she teaches and they encounter metas on the side.)

Ray decides he wants to bounce too. We don’t quite know where he’s going, but he’s decided he’s not returning from the dead just yet. He probably wants to experiment with shrinking and growing. Also, as Roy Harper, Malcolm Merlyn, and Sara Lance both know, there are advantages to everyone thinking you’re dead.

Flechettes:

• I’ve been enjoying how much Thea has been helping Oliver with his campaign.
• Now that I think about it, how did Palmer Tech not completely collapse with that explosion Ray caused.

• Curtis Holt meets Oliver Queen, everyone.
• I’m not really sure what happened in the flashbacks, but you probably don’t care either so…
• Curtis’ reaction to Mama Smoak was amazing.

• “Oliver told me you’ve been working non-stop…” HOW DO YOU CODE LIKE YOU’RE RUNNING OUT OF TIME? CODE AND NIGHT LIKE YOU NEED IT TO SURVIVE? — and done.
• Olicity arguing over the comms was great. All I ever wanted. Loved the team’s reactions — rather than being properly annoyed, they were all so amused. “She sent me one of those emojis with the single tear.”
• Also, LOOK AT THIS LARGE TEAM. A TEAM THIS LARGE IS TOO BIG FOR STARLING CITY. IT’S TIME FOR THEM TO SAVE THE WORLD. And I believe whatever Damien’s plans are, they’re much bigger than Star City. “The new life I breathe in this world.”

• Also, the line from last week’s flashback tells us that Star City could be a place like Lian Yu, a place that draws in baddies… Is there a Hellmouth in Star City? Perhaps opened by Malcolm’s earthquake in season one?
• That shot of Felicity alone in the lair with the chair sliding to the center of their very well lit floor was very nice.
• Diggle doing the tennis head back and forth between Oliver and Felicity was delightful, especially because OT3 FEELS! Love that he got to help Oliver, but I would have loved a moment between him and Felicity as well. Perhaps next Olicity fight.
• Damien got so offended that Lance called magic “mumbo jumbo.” SO offended!
• Also, DAMIEN HAS MAGIC. How in the world will Team Arrow defe– OH WAIT. THE MAGICIAN. Malcolm Merlyn will, once again, be the answer to their Darhk problems. While creating several more, I’m sure.

• GUYS THAT PROMO. If you’ve seen it, I’m mad they spoiled that thing. If you haven’t, don’t watch it. It feels like a better reveal if the promo department didn’t blatantly spoil what’s coming. Especially because it was a random thought we had a couple of weeks ago and that they didn’t harp on it, therefore leaving it under the radar (unlike the potential Felicity Darhk twist). So, UGH. I’m upset they spoiled it and hopefully future promos this week don’t. We’ll chat in the comments or on Twitter if you don’t already know what I’m talking about.
• Oliver writes in a journal, guys. What’s he writing about? His day? His hopes and dreams? Hmm.
• When Felicity says, “I think we should…” Oliver’s head snapped up so fast, he should have a sprain.
• Everyone gets booed up in this episode! Olicity patches things up. Thea and Alex the Campaign Manager decide to go out. Even Lance gets flirty with Mama Smoak (I’ve been waiting for that for sooo long!).

• Only the Lance sisters remain single by episodes end…
• What’s Damien’s jig-saw puzzle…?

Another thing:

I think sometimes those of us in the fandom (people who write and read recaps for instance, or people who go on Twitter) forget that we’re not the only parts of the fandom. There are people who watch this show a little (or a lot) more casually than we do. They don’t really know Legends of Tomorrow is coming. There have been TV spots I think and it’s been in the news, but it hasn’t really come into casual viewers’ faces full steam like it has those of us who follow the creators and the Hollywood trades on Twitter.

So it’s easy to forget that to a lot of the general public, Sara really is leaving again to be off screen somewhere. They don’t know that Sara is gonna be hanging out with Ray and Captain Cold and Rip Hunter and the rest in a matter of weeks. If they saw a trailer or teaser, they might have forgotten who exactly was in it. So all of this feels obvious to all of us, but to many, it’s gonna be an awesome shock when all these stories come together during the Flarrow hiatus. Just want to throw that out there because it’s important to remember that the writers don’t just write for the hardcore fans, they have to appease general viewers too. (This is something I think a lot about with Supergirl, which has to cater to the uberfan superhero audience, but also young kids who are watching this show with their parents.)

Lastly: Everyone is alive and happy. What’s the Whedon-plan to tear everything apart?

After the horrific attacks in Paris and Beirut over the weekend, CBS decided to postpone the already scheduled episode of Supergirl — which apparently centered around a terrorist attack in National City — and instead aired the Thanksgiving episode that was slated for next week. This shuffle in the schedule could have led to some continuity gaps, but apart from a weirdly resurrected Jimmy/Lucy relationship, it didn’t feel too out of place. So what did we think of the latest incarnation of Livewire’s origins?

Well, before we get to the Villain of the Week, we cold open to a gnarly looking alien breaking free of “his” chains and rampaging through the DEO’s underground bunker. Fortunately, Kara was onsite to subdue the beast — and also learn that the “he” is a “she,” to which Kara gives the best line reading of the night.

While Supergirl was taking care of business at the DEO, Alex — who had the day off, I guess? — was frantically bugging her sister over her earpiece. What’s got Alex so riled up? Well, it’s Thanksgiving (a week early) and their mother, Eliza Danvers, is coming to town for the holiday. Kara is thrilled about it, but Alex is the opposite. Apparently, Supergirl isn’t the only secret identity in the family since Alex is a closeted DEO agent. She also has some unresolved mommy issues that stem from the jealousy that comes with having an alien sister who can fly, and shoot laser beams from her eyes to help cook dinner.

Kara flies back just in time to welcome their mother to her apartment. She doesn’t even change into civilian clothes and greets her at the door in full Supergirl regalia. Of course, she’s super psyched to show her mother she’s a superhero and is totally adorable about it.

Meanwhile, shock jock Leslie Willis is on the air and spouting off about how much she detests Supergirl. It feels like the writers are using Leslie to represent haters of the show since many of her criticisms mimic the ones that abounded when the show was announced. Also, she’s “live and wired,” natch.

Apparently, she didn’t get the memo from a few episodes back. The media is supposed to love Supergirl now. It turns out that Willis’ show is on air owned by CatCo, and the boss doesn’t appreciate the hero she practically trademarked to get strewn through the mud. So she demotes Leslie to traffic chopper duty. That’s going to be important later.

Kara is going around the office inviting her #Superfriends to her place for Turkey Day. Winn is the first invite because he’s her bestie (is there a fanbase for this ship yet?) and because he doesn’t have a family to go home to. We learn that Winn Schott is actually a Junior and that his father is serving time in prison. Though he doesn’t mention it, I’m pretty sure Winslow Sr. also has a thing for toys.

Winn is on cloud nine at the prospect of spending Friendsgiving with Kara and her family, but is soon brought back down to Earth when she also extends the invite to JimmyJames.

Unfortunately, James and Lucy Lane have rekindled their romance (in Offscreen City — or the original Episode 4. Guess we’ll find out next week) and are having a couples getaway over the holiday. So now Winn and Kara are sad about their crushes.

When Leslie’s chopper hits some turbulence, it starts going down. Because if you know anything about Super mythos, helicopters are never a good idea — especially if you’re named Lois Lane. Of course, Leslie isn’t Lois, so instead of getting rescued, she gets electrocuted by a bolt of lightning with Supergirl caught in the middle. Instead of being killed by the bolt, Leslie is imbued with special abilities. It’s basically an origin straight out of Superman: The Animated Series.

Back at Kara’s apartment, Alex was right to be wary of her mother visiting. While Eliza is indeed proud of Kara’s ascension to superhero status, she also scolds Alex for letting her secret out (and now her mommy issues make sense). We then flashback to life in the Danvers home when Kara and Alex were little kids — and honestly, these scenes are way better than the action in the present.

After bedtime, the two sisters sneak out of the house and Kara shows Alex a whole new world by flying around the city. After their magic Krypton ride, the Danvers are furious and scold them — but mostly Alex — for being irresponsible. This is also when the parents make like the King and Queen of Arendelle and forbid Elsa Kara from using her powers again. Right on cue, agents from the DEO come knocking, led by none other than Director Estes Henshaw. They’ve finally come for Kara and plan to use her for nefarious reasons since Superman has refused to cooperate.

Rather than give up his newly adopted daughter, Pa Danvers offers himself up to the DEO. After all…

So it seems that Alex wasn’t the first Danvers to work for Henshaw. In fact, their father’s death is somehow linked to Pa Danvers’ time at the DEO under Henshaw. When the sisters learn this, they realize it’s up to them to uncover the mystery of how their father died. And for the first time this season, I actually give a shit about the DEO plotline.

Back in the present, the newly christened Livewire is wreaking havoc all across National City. She zeroes in on one of the people she blames for her current predicament, Cat Grant. One evening when Cat and Kara are working late, Livewire materializes from the electricity in the building.

She goes toe to toe with Kara and eventually escapes. The next day, DEO agents posed as the FBI investigate the scene. Though Livewire isn’t alien in nature, they still help Kara devise a way to trap her using a machine straight out of Ghostbusters. In fact, Kara even calls them out on it.

Of course, the second big boss fight doesn’t go according to plan, even with the Ghostbusters doo-hickey in tow. So Kara does the next best thing and finds a firehose because water is Livewire’s Kryptonite in any version of the story.

Overall, it was another strong episode of Supergirl — which despite strong numbers for its debut, is actually on the bubble at CBS for renewal, which is a shame. The twist about Kara and Alex’s father is a really strong one and provides more opportunities for Dean Cain to be on the show. Hopefully, the ratings will stabilize enough for CBS to give them a full season to play out.

In the meantime, we’ll wait for next week to fill in the gaps regarding Lucy and James’ budding romance since it looks like the one that was supposed to be this week’s episode will be airing then.

The Flash has reached near terminal velocity in my eyes with this episode featuring The Flash family at it’s craziest and the welcoming of Linda Park to the team. We all knew Linda had to get into the Secret Speedster Society at some point, considering she is the future Mrs. Wally West, but I did not expect it to be so freaking fun.

Linda Park is… a ball of light.

Not to mention that we finally get Zoom’d! …some of the team is zoomed harder and more painfully than others. Seriously, Zoom is the baddest villain to hit the TV in a long, long time.

The episode begins with a fakeout beating of The Flash by Doctor Light. She zaps him with her star energy and steals the insignia right off of Barry’s chest. The audience eventually learns it’s an act to bait Zoom through a breach (thoughtfully outside of heavily populated Central City), and Prime-Linda, meta-powerless and “trained” by Team Flash members, is impersonating her Earth-2 counterpart. Brilliantly, the episode ends with an actual beating of The Flash, and it is brutal. But more on that later.

Light Linda-2 tries to explain herself to a suited-up Barry about her plan to kill Linda so that Zoom would think she was dead. Which wasn’t that great of a plan considering that Zoom obviously knows about the doppelgangers of the two Earths. It’s obvious she’s terrified; Zoom makes people act out of desperation… something Harry Wells (Earth-2) has been trying to tell them all along.

Zoom is the Regina George of Metahumans. #TheFlash #DatFlash #MeanGirls

— The Nerds of Color (@TheNerdsofColor) November 11, 2015

Flash!Barry continues to try and convince Light Linda-2 to help them. He is also desperate, but its so noble and Barry Allen that we ignore how unprepared he is. Actually, it seems like the whole team (Harry Wells included) except for Caitlin thinks that a Zoom Trap as soon as possible will totally and most definitely work. Spoiler alert: It totally and most definitely does not.

The plan? Surprise the speedster. Shoot Zoom as he runs through the breach. With a speed-slowing serum shooter yet to be invented by “Ramon.” At least Harry isn’t calling Cisco “Crisco” anymore.

In flashbacks to Earth-2, we see why Wells is so quick to vote “yes” for Barry’s premature Zoom Battle Plan: he has a daughter named Jesse who was kidnapped by Zoom. Why? Because she is a freaking speedster and Golden Age Jay Garrick’s speedy sidekick. In Harry’s world, Jess is a genius and most likely the reason Harry Wells has made it his point to help meta-humans. It’s also the reason for his aggressive resentment towards Jay Garrick; if Earth-2 Flash had “done his job,” his daughter would be safe. It’s why Harry went to find Barry Allen on our Earth: to get his daughter back with a speedster that he believes is fast enough.

Oh Jesse Quick is Wells daughter on Earth 2? #TheFlash #DatFlash pic.twitter.com/UUuREpb77m

— Black Nerd Problems (@blknrdproblems) November 11, 2015

Patty is obsessed with the Doctor Light case, and Joe immediately shuts her down. P. Spivvy has the serious capacity to throw a wrench into Team Flash’s plans if she doesn’t get in on the secret soon. Like I theorized last week, Patty is going to find out Barry’s identity on her own; Joe does his best to curb her meta-enthusiasm, but he’s only fueling her to figure out what the hell is up. Not to mention, she seems like a people-pleaser and Joe has the extra status of work partner/boyfriend’s father… so, yeah, good luck Papa West.

Patty thinks maybe it’s because she made out with his son, but Barry assures her that’s not the case since Joe doesn’t even know.

I can't deal with this overt flirting. It's such a change from the sub-text of Westallen and Snowbarry. #TheFlash #DatFlash #Zoom

— The Nerds of Color (@TheNerdsofColor) November 11, 2015

In ParkWest world (the best world ever ever ever!), Linda pleads for Iris to let The Flash know that she wants to help. She and Iris showcase their amazingness while discussing their desires to ditch the Damsel in Distress archetype they’ve been locked into and remind me why they are the two canonical women that our Flashes (Barry Allen and Wally West) fall for.

Linda Park: “I don’t want to sit around and be told not to worry my pretty little head about it.”

Iris West: “I get that. Believe me, I do.”

Meanwhile back at the Lab, Doctor Light escapes the pipeline by becoming invisible. Something something science. Something something visible light. Oh, she’ll definitely be back. Harry keeps telling Barry “I TOLD YOU I TOLD YOU I TOLD YOU SO,” and Barry is understandably annoyed. Cisco is also annoyed. Basically EVERYONE IS ANNOYED AT HARRY WELLS.

Joe, ever the optimist, is all “…maybe it’s a sign?” and Caitlin nods vehemently. The Team is split in half, which I personally enjoy because it shows that it’s not a complete dictatorship in Flash HQ… but Barry does, ultimately, make the executive decision to continue with the plan. Adjustments must be made. Zoom must be stopped!

*cue lightning and swelling music*

"You're putting lots of faith in someone wearing the face of your mother's killer" Spit the truth like you spit those bullets, Joe #DatFlash

— hellresidentNY (@hellresidentNY) November 11, 2015

There’s also a quick Joe/Barry heart-to-heart that we love… but the best part is when Joe brings up Barry’s tryouts for the high school football team, and Barry is still extra-sensitive about it. I’m guessing Barry was no Clark Kent.

Cisco ridiculously tries to get close to Harry Wells by ditching his salty attitude and attempts to, like, massage Wells’ back or fist bump him or something. It’s f*cking weird. C’mon, Cisco, this man you’re trying to grope and vibe on is the literal genius who outed your meta-powers. He knows what you’re playing at, fool. And it pissed him the f*ck off.

I guess he doesn’t want Cisco to Vibe this painful Earth-2 memory:

Patty tries to repair her work relationship with Joe, even though it’s not even broken. Patty bumbles about transparency and honesty and making out with Barry Allen. Joe is uncomfortable. Patty can’t take the hint that Joe is not going to say anything about Light’s case.

At the West residence, Linda is stress-cooking, and it’s fantastic. This episode really fleshes out Linda Park’s character from background secondary figure towards the significant role she plays in the Flash-verse. I’m impatiently waiting for Wally West to get to Central City, but I don’t mind waiting if the show continues to set up Linda as an adorable, kickass cupcake.

http://aaronslivesy.tumblr.com/post/132974675529

While Linda frosts some cookies or prepares a casserole or something, Barry and Iris get a not-so-genius idea to have Linda impersonate Doctor Light to draw Zoom out of his Earth onto theirs. Iris assures Barry that Linda isn’t terrified: she’s furious and eager to help in any way she can. Iris has faith in Linda and thinks that the decision shouldn’t be made by anyone but her.

"Let Linda decide." THANK YOU, IRIS WEST. Because she has so often had her decisions made for her. #TheFlash #DatFlash

— The Nerds of Color (@TheNerdsofColor) November 11, 2015

So “The Flash” invites Linda to the lab to go through some crunchtime fake-supervillain training. This is where things get awesome: the team all works together to try to make Linda as Light-y as possible. It’s kind of like the Hunger Games training center, but just way, way more fun.

http://kisapandemonium.tumblr.com/post/132974710229/art

IT IS QUITE POSSIBLE THAT I MAY BECOME A LINDA PARK STAN. Check back in at the end of this season.

Linda learns to shoot the cardboard cutouts of her ex-boyfriend Barry Allen’s best friends a fact that Linda may have missed due to all of the excitement with her brand new lumos gloves, but the whole messy situation does nothing to build the confidence of the team.

"Maybe if she didn't scream every time she fired." OH I'M LINDA IF I HAD POWERS. #TheFlash #DatFlash #Zoom

— The Nerds of Color (@TheNerdsofColor) November 11, 2015

Literally everyone tries to talk Barry out of this terrible terrible terrible plan giving him ALL the reasons: she can’t handle it, you’re projecting your residual feelings from the Reverse Flash, etc. etc… but Barry knows what to do to build Linda’s confidence; he officially reveals his face to her. Linda Park’s reaction? Priceless. (And accurate.)

http://legendsofdc.tumblr.com/post/132974005173

Also, I’m pretty sure I just ship Barry Allen with everyone. I just fully support Barry making out with awesome female characters. Especially during hilariously awful superhero dialogue. Barry and Linda fail to convince Zoom that “Doctor Light” killed Zoom, even after Linda took the Flash insignia off his chest and threw it into the breach (thus bringing it back to the fakeout intro).

It was like a weird roleplay sexual fantasy… but they’re so cute.

http://kisapandemonium.tumblr.com/post/132975999894/how-was-that-a-little-too-much

This scene deserves to be watched and rewatched. It’s pure cheese that only The Flash can pull off…  although Supergirl is starting to get there. I know that Barry/Linda are a thing of the past, romantically, but I’m excited to see how this friendship progresses.

One friendship already in progress is Iris/Linda. These two… I love them and am so proud to have two strong, funny, caring, badass women of color sharing a supportive relationship. It’s so easy to pit women against women, and to see these two onscreen is something truly special.

http://flashallens.tumblr.com/post/133002361868

ParkWest is so strong. #TheFlash #DatFlash #Zoom

— The Nerds of Color (@TheNerdsofColor) November 11, 2015

But the happy moment ends when Linda leaves the office to be abducted by Zoom. It actually feels like the end of all happy moments; I think that the extra ridiculousness of Linda’s training was meant to offset how badly shit hits the proverbial fan once Zoom enters the picture.

http://legendsofdc.tumblr.com/post/132977629883/zoom-in-0206

Zoom is scary and seemingly unbeatable. Barry manages to rescue Linda when Zoom drops her from the top of S.T.A.R.’s roof, but only because Zoom lets him. In fact, Zoom is very much in charge of the whole encounter. There’s a second where we hopefully believe that Barry is ready for this when he forces Zoom into a “free fall fight” at terminal velocity and evening out the speedforce playing field.

Oh… Zoom catches him, alright. He catches the speed-dampening dart that Harry tries to shoot at him, and he catches our Barry in a horrible beating. Zoom is fucking fast. Terrifyingly fast.

That was THE MOST notorious ass-whopping in recent history. #DatFlash #TheFlash

— BlackGirlGeeks (@BlackGirlGeeks) November 11, 2015

I was so horrified and most likely covering my eyes that I missed a major moment before Zoom stabs Barry in the chest with the anti-speed serum:

Ohhhhhhhh that’s why he was dragging around Barry like a rag doll… HE SNAPPED HIS SPINE AND RUINED HIS LEGS. HIS MAGIC LEGS.

It’s painful to watch Barry being flung around like a floppy, red leather purse. Even worse, Zoom puppets him around the city that had just recently heralded Barry as their savior and hero. For the audience, it’s even harder to watch knowing Barry is underneath the mask being humiliated in front of Iris and Patty and the CCPD.

Zoom drags Barry’s body one last time back to S.T.A.R. Labs and taunts Harry Wells. What the hell happened between the two of them?! He holds Barry up by the throat and is about to use that famous jack knife hand trick that we all know, but Cisco shoots him in the neck. Zoom is only temporarily stunned but speeds off. Harry Wells screams, “NOOOOO!”

He was definitely about to kill Barry. Straight up. Three separate times. Joe is pissed and finally unleashes on Earth-2 Wells. We finally learn Harry’s secret about his daughter Jess, and he and Joe share a surprising fatherhood moment.

You can hear the disappointment and genuine anguish in Harry’s voice. Zoom didn’t send him to kill Barry… he came here of his own accord in a plan to capture Zoom and get his daughter back. Do we trust him yet? I really, really am starting to. I hope my faith isn’t misplaced.

Barry wakes up to Cisco and Caitlin smiling at him. Their smiles fade when Barry tells them he can’t feel his legs.

Super Quick Earth-2 Thing:

Oliver Queen-2 is dead and his father, Robert Queen, is the one who took on the green hood and bow after being marooned on an island. At first, this just seems like a great easter egg, but it’s likely to be a hint that Barry Allen-2 is dead, too. Maybe, like Ollie-2’s daddy, Henry Allen’s fate is more similar to Prime-Barry’s in that Henry became a speedster. But not as the hero.

Maybe Barry-2’s possible death is the thing that made the war between Zoom and Wells personal. Wells’ “conversation” about parenthood with Joe on Prime Earth hinted at this. Nice job, writers.

But wouldn’t Zoom have recognized Barry once he demasked him post-ass beating? Or has he become so demonic and inhuman that his only fuel is his need for speed and his hatred of Wells? I don’t think we’ll find out until the mid-season finale. Until then, Grodd and Flarrow crossover!

Originally posted at Angry Asian Man

As we near the end of 2015, one thing is for sure: it’s a great time to be an Asian American television consumer. For the first time in history, you’ll need two hands to count the number of major television programs to feature Asian American leads! On ABC alone, you have shows like Fresh of the Boat, Dr. Ken, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Quantico.

This Sunday night, the biggest network of them all — AMC — throws its hat into the ring with Into the Badlands, a dystopian martial arts drama starring Daniel Wu. And I can safely say the show is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.

The series is set hundreds of years in the future, presumably after the zombie apocalypse wipes out mankind¹, where guns have been outlawed and civilization has degenerated into a feudal society in which powerful Barons rule their respective territories with the aid of loyal armies of trained assassins known as Clippers. It’s also (very) loosely based on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West.

Daniel Wu plays Sunny, the most feared Clipper in all of the Badlands. The series kicks off when Sunny encounters a group of bandits who are smuggling a young boy… somewhere? What ensues is probably the best martial arts sequence in the history of American television (sorry Arrow and Daredevil, but that’s kids’ stuff compared to what Daniel Wu is doing on AMC). The boy, named M.K. and played by newcomer Aramis Knight, is taken back to Sunny’s Baron — played by Marton Csokas — and is to be trained as a next-gen Clipper. Sunny eventually learns that he shares a mysterious connection to the teen, who also harbors a dark secret that a rival Baron — Emily Beecham’s Widow — is trying to uncover.

As you can probably guess, there is a lot of world building that happens in this first episode. But it’s all necessary and sucks you into the fantasy right away. Visually, the show is gorgeous with great sweeping vistas of terrain that is simultaneously futuristic and Antebellum. That’s the other thing that’s a little jarring at first. Into the Badlands feels like a mashup of a bunch of different genres. Nominally, it’s a martial arts epic, but there are elements of the western, steampunk, Southern Gothic, mythical, and superhero genres woven throughout. It even has a comic book origin story.

At its center stands Daniel Wu. Already an icon in Hong Kong, the 40-year old California native is finally staking his claim to American superstardom with this role. If the first two episodes are any indication, he’s well on his way! It’s hard to believe how groundbreaking it is to see an Asian American man play an action hero on TV. Not since Russel Wong on Vanishing Son two decades ago, at least. Except this time, we even get two Asian American male leads.

More than that, Sunny is also in the mold of AMC’s difficult men wheelhouse that has done wonders for the careers of Jon Hamm, Bryan Cranston, and Andrew Lincoln. While a lot of viewers are tuning in for the fight scenes, Wu brings layers of complexity and nuance to the character that is unheard of for Asian American male leads. Sunny gets to be stoic, cold-hearted, caring, badass, and sexy all at once. Seriously, by the number of times Sunny is shirtless in the pilot, you’d think this was The CW².

Some folks might go into this show wary of the idea that the first AMC drama to feature an Asian American male lead has to be a martial arts show. But I say you don’t need to worry. I’ve gone on record before about why we shouldn’t recoil at the idea of an Asian American-led martial arts show (take note, Marvel/Netflix!) so long as the characters are written with dimension and complexity. Into the Badlands does this, albeit in a heightened and hyper violent reality.

Besides, from what I’ve already seen, Into the Badlands breaks all kinds of racist TV tropes, and I kinda love the show because of it.

For obvious reasons, we’ve been riding the Into the Badlands train from jump, and now that it’s here — and a huge hit — we couldn’t wait to add the show to the Recap rotation. We’ve been holding on to this one for a while too, since we got an early look at episode two a few months ago. As much as I dug the pilot, I always thought the second episode was where the series was going to take off with audiences. And if nerd twitter was any indication Sunday night, everyone else agreed.

Like the debut episode, “Fist Like a Bullet” cold opens with a fantastically choreographed fight scene. This time, the series’ main antagonist — The Widow, played by Emily Beecham — does the ass-kicking in a very Old West/steampunk inspired strip club (complete with power tools). It seems that Nomads have been hired to take her out; whether they’re the same Nomad group she had kidnap M.K. remains to be seen. Nevertheless, Beecham gets to show off some of her kung fu training, and we get to see that awesome opening credit sequence again — featuring music by Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda. This show is so Asian.

Later M.K. is making his way through the woods — after escaping The Fort last week — and comes across a stranger who looks like if adolescent Zooey Deschanel had a Japanese fetish (so basically Baby Katy Perry). She identifies herself as Tilda, and after some uncomfortable banter between the two, they hear horses in the distance. Apparently, the Baron has sent a Clipper force to locate the runaway, so she takes M.K. to her mother to be kept safe. Of course, this ends up being a terrible idea.

Sunny just so happens to be leading the search party and orders his men to stop pursuing because they’ve reached the border between Baron Quinn’s territory and The Widow’s turf. And this is our first hint at Tilda’s parentage. Immediately, M.K. realizes he’s being led into the one place he’s been trying so desperately to escape — remember, Sunny rescued him from The Widow’s band of Nomads last ep. Widow pretends not to recognize M.K. and even interrogates him about his pendant (which is currently in the Baron’s possession). He lies unconvincingly, and Widow lets him go. Also, mother and daughter creepily watch him as he bathes.

Back at the Fort, Quinn is still pissed that one of his slave boys has escaped and blames his son Ryder for being an idiot. He also tasks Sunny to come with him on a special trip to the doctor’s office. This is unusual because Quinn doesn’t normally venture out of the walls for routine visits, and he also doesn’t request an entourage. Just Sunny.

At the doctor’s house, Quinn learns that his frequent headaches are the result of a growing and inoperable brain tumor. Quinn isn’t too thrilled about this news. While Quinn is getting checked out, Sunny has a heart-to-heart with the doctor’s wife. We learn that Sunny’s secret girlfriend Veil is actually the adopted daughter of the doctor and his wife. She also knows about their secret romance and the baby on the way. Quinn emerges from the exam room and exchanges pleasantries with the doctor and his family. Outside, Quinn tells Sunny to go back inside and murder the both of them. Sunny refuses to kill his secret in-laws so the Baron gets his own hands dirty.

He’s also not too happy about his chief Clipper’s outward defiance, and orders him to torch the house. This absolutely destroys Sunny, and plants the first seeds of his eventual turn against his Baron. It also leads to the strongest scene in the whole episode, when Sunny promises Veil that they will be leaving the Badlands.

P.S., shout out to the homies at Black Nerd Problems for getting their hashtag #KillaClipps co-signed by none other than Veil herself!

This on top of Daniel Wu praising the Black Girl Nerds’ tag #ColorMeBadlands last week!

We really need to step our hashtag game up.

Anyway, back at the Widow’s plantation, she still has suspicions about M.K.’s identity and tells Tilda to draw his blood in order to make him go Super Saiyan again. Because Tilda has an unconditional crush on the boy, she gets him to feign the injury and fool her mother for the time being. At the same time, Widow has invited a group of Nomads to work together against Quinn.

They refuse to work with the Widow — whose plantation is basically Themyscira since M.K. is the only dude in the whole place — because they’re all misogynists. Widow offers up Tilda in a deal. If the Nomads can take her out, she will be given to them. If TIlda wins, though, their alliance will be solidified. Needless to say, Tilda wins.

The Nomads do get one consolation prize, though: M.K. Their first move is to set a trap for Ryder. Because he’s an idiot, he falls for it and leads himself and Sunny into an ambush at a decommissioned wind turbine. Why? Because an extended fight sequence inside a wind turbine. That’s why.

Even though Sunny takes out most of the Nomads, their leader is still able to get the jump on him and is about to choke him out until M.K. shows up in the nick of time. Now, Sunny owes the kid a life debt. M.K. also admits that he does indeed know the way out of the Badlands, and Sunny sees — perhaps for the first time — an opportunity for freedom for himself and for Veil. In return for saving his life, Sunny offers to train him, and thus a hero/sidekick partnership is born.

The fifth episode of Supergirl on CBS finally aired last night, and now we know how the continuity glitches from last week’s episode would be resolved. In case you didn’t know, the episode “How Does She Do It” was scheduled to air last week, but was postponed after terrorists attacked several sites in Paris and Beirut. Instead, they aired the Thanksgiving episode that introduced Livewire, but also picked up a couple story threads that weren’t woven until last night. So was the delay worth it?

It depends. Of the five episodes that have aired already, this one was probably my least favorite. While there were some nice bits — particularly, Kara’s battles with a mysterious drone and a sequence in which she prevents a building from collapsing after a bomb is detonated — the episode felt really flat to me.

Maybe it was the scheduling switcheroo, but I didn’t find myself caring for many of the subplots. The main plot revolved around a series of bombings around National City — which is why this episode was postponed in the first place — that seemingly targeted billionaire tech magnate Maxwell Lord. The continuity glitches from last week were even more apparent last night. References to Reactron, the Jimmy/Lucy deal, and “good guy” Henshaw made it obvious this episode was out of order.

The lesser plots focused on Kara’s attempts to babysit Cat’s young son while she was away beating Lois Lane for an award and a will-they-or-won’t-they between Lois’ sister Lucy and the man formerly known as Superman’s Best Pal Jimmy. The latter plot was even more distracting since we saw they had already reconciled by Thanksgiving. I guess foiled terrorists attacks work wonders for strained relationships.

I will say that the character of Maxwell Lord is actually growing on me. He’s being played very much in the Lex Luthor vein, and Peter Facinelli’s portrayal is very reminiscent of Michael Rosenbaum’s Lex on seven seasons of Smallville. Except Maxwell is pretty much leaning in to his evil.

Turns out that the bombings and the drone strikes were all orchestrated by Lord, not to murder anyone, but to test Supergirl’s abilities. Her speed, strength, stamina, and morality were all bagged and tagged by various pieces of Lord Tech. Moreover, several scenes between Lord and Alex set off a dozen new ships to sea as the internet began fawning over potential #AlMax pairings.

The plots all come to a head when Kara is forced to choose between saving a train full of a hundred passengers and a bomb at an airport which could take out thousands more. Because Winn and Cat’s son are on the train, Kara decides to go for the train and sends the DEO to the airport — where James, unbeknownst to Kara, has gone to find Lucy who might be in danger.

On the train, Supergirl tries to reason with the bomber, who is a disgruntled former Lord Tech employee, but is unable to convince him to disarm. The perp flips the detonator, and Kara has to sever the car from the rest of the train. She watches the bomber’s car travel several more yards before blowing up.

She also realizes that the bomber may have been operating against his own interests and finds out that he was merely a pawn in a larger game. Later, Lord indirectly reveals that he was behind the whole plot and was particularly interested in the fact that Supergirl saved the train rather than the plane. This turn of events leads Lord to believe that Supergirl’s secret identity is tied to one of the passengers on the train, pretty much telegraphing a future episode in which Lord kidnaps Winn — thinking he’s Kara’s sweetheart.

The end of the episode mirrors a pretty classic Supes/Lex tête-à-tête as Supergirl confronts Lord in the window of his high-rise office, promising that Maxwell Lord will be Supergirl’s arch nemesis for the duration of the series.

The third episode of Into the Badlands — “White Stork Spreads Wings” — will be the last one to follow The Walking Dead since last night was the mid-season finale for everyone’s favorite zombie show. How Badlands will fare without its massive lead-in will be a question to be answered next week. If this episode is any indication, viewers should be coming back in full force even without a zombie pre-show.

Unbelievably, we’ve reached the mid-season point on Badlands since the season is only six shows long. The episode kicks off with an intense Clipper vs. Clipper battle royale at the Widow’s mansion. After coming for Quinn’s son last week, the Baron has sent his fighters to seek vengeance on his biggest rival. The Widow’s all-female Clipper force is more than up to the challenge and takes out several of Quinn’s red-leathered killers.

Mere minutes into the cold open, we see the first mano a Widow as the two warring barons have an epic sword battle.

Mind you, the credits haven’t even rolled yet!

Quinn gets the upper hand and is about to take out his enemy when his tumor strikes and Widow turns the tables. Sunny shows up in the nick of time and Widow and her butterfly crew flee her mansion for safer pastures elsewhere. In the commotion, M.K. makes off with a mysterious book emblazoned with the symbol of Asra.

Meanwhile, back at the Fort, the Baron’s wives argue about the fate of Ryder who still hasn’t recovered from last week’s Nomad ambush. The only people who could save him were murdered in cold blood by the Baron, so Jade comes up with the next best thing. The doctor’s adopted daughter — who also happens to be Sunny’s betrothed — Veil.

It also just so happens that Jade and Veil are actually old friends and grew up together.

Jade is desperate to save the Baron’s son, mostly because she’s also banging him. We’re not sure if Lydia realizes this though, but eventually relents when Veil is brought to the house to do some healing in a scene straight out of Cinemax’s The Knick. It seems that Ryder is suffering from brain swelling, and if Veil doesn’t relieve the pressure (by basically drilling into his temple) he’s gonna die.

After the successful procedure, Sunny — who had been visiting his tattoo artist Ringo — returns to the Fort and is shocked to see Veil in the Baron’s home.

That’s not the only surprise, however, since Quinn admits that he’s been aware of Veil’s affair with Sunny for some time. This is the first time in which Madeleine Mantock — the actress who plays Veil — gets significant, and boy does she shine! It’s clear from the outset that the episode is shining the spotlight on the women of the Badlands as Jade, Lydia, and Veil take center stage along with the Widow and her minions, of course.

As the Butterflies descend on their new homebase, Widow sends Tilda to extract Angelica, their mole from the brothel — the undercover prostitute who set the trap for Ryder in the previous ep — because she knows Sunny will be after her. Tilda’s too late though because when she arrives, Sunny and Angelica are engaged in some wire-fu that’s straight out of a Yuen Woo Ping fever dream.

Before Sunny can get any answers, Angelica commits suicide by plunging herself over the side of the balcony. Before heading back, Sunny takes M.K. to Veil’s clinic so he can get stitched up. Though the two pretend they aren’t lovers, M.K. figures it out pretty quickly, Also, they’re terrible at pretending they aren’t lovers.

Speaking of M.K., Aramis Knight doesn’t have much to do this episode but whine about Obi-Wan not spending enough time training him to become a Jedi Master. Though it leads to a pretty nifty scene in which Sunny takes M.K. to meet his mentor Waldo — played by the incomparable Stephen Lang — and teach the kid a lesson or two about underestimating his opponents.

Later, when Ryder begins to waken from his treatment, his mother chides him for basically being an idiot. By plunging his father’s forces into an unnecessary war with the Widow, Ryder has screwed up everything. It turns out the other barons are none too pleased with Quinn’s move on the Widow — and consequently her oil fields — and have requested his presence at a Godfather-esque meeting of all the barons.

Sunny warns that it’s obviously a trap, and Quinn agrees. So he sends Sunny to meet with the regent — that would be head clipper — of one Baron that might align with Quinn and his people. Sunny and Zypher, the other regent, meet in a far off poppy field. Not only is Zypher a woman — played by Spartacus’ Ellen Hollman — apparently, she and Sunny have a sexual history too.

The two agree to strike a deal (maybe?) but this is the Badlands, someone is bound to betray somebody else. Speaking of betrayals, M.K. shows up at Veil’s clinic after hours and without Sunny’s knowledge. M.K. knows Veil can read (since literacy is a rarity in the Badlands) and asks her to translate the Asra book he found at the Widow’s.

The problem is that the book is written in a language no one knows (elvish?) and she is unable to help. At that moment, Baron Quinn comes barging in to her home. And in one of the tensest scenes on the show to date, you think the Baron is about to do something obscene to Veil, but finally, he asks her to operate on his brain tumor since she miraculously saved his son.

Will Veil do the operation? And since she knows Quinn murdered her family, will she use that opportunity to return the favor? Guess we’ll have to tune in next week — without zombies — to find out.

After a couple of weeks of out-of-order continuity, we finally got back on track with “Red Faced,” the latest episode of Supergirl. In addition to the live action debut of Red Tornado — and despite the internet’s jokes when the look was revealed earlier, the Red Tornado actually looked pretty good in action. Still wish they kept his blue cape, though — the episode probably delivered the strongest storyline of the season so far.

The story kicks off with Kara peacefully soaring above National City when a road rage incident gets her attention. Supergirl swoops in and saves a group of school children from being run over by a couple of jerks in souped up BMWs. Rather than apologizing for almost committing vehicular homicide, the driver decides to pick a fight with Supergirl! He swings at her, and Supergirl sends the idiot flying. Of course, the media plays this up as a story of Supergirl losing her cool. So much for all the goodwill she’s engendered over the past couple weeks.

Kara isn’t the only one who is losing her temper in National City. James is upset that Lucy’s father — that would be General Sam Lane — is coming to town for a visit. Also, Cat Grant’s mother — who was mentioned but not seen last episode — is also in town from Metropolis, much to the dismay of the Queen of All Media. So clearly, the show’s theme is about how all of the main characters have to deal with their anger issues. Because things are boiling over for everyone.

It turns out that General Lane isn’t just in town for a daddy/daughter day. At least not in the traditional sense. Instead, the general’s reason for being in National City is to pay a visit to the DEO and show off the Army’s latest acquisition, an android known as Project Retweet RT. It seems that the military wants to test out its new toy by having it go toe to toe with Supergirl. Henshaw and Alex scoff at the idea, but when Lucy shows up — see, it was a daddy/daughter day after all — with an executive order from the president, Supergirl agrees. Mainly, so she can pretend Red Tornado is Lucy Lane and punch it in its face.

At Game Night, Lucy and James prove that they are an annoyingly perfect couple together, while Winn and Kara prove that they are adorable together. I know they’re setting up Kara/Jimmy as the big romance on the show, so is it wrong that I kind of prefer Winn for her instead?

After Winn almost gives away Kara’s secret identity, Lucy reveals that she met Supergirl earlier in the day and proceeds to trash her in front of the SuperFriends. Not a good look, Lucy.

The next day, Kara arrives at DEO’s desert HQ and preps for her match up with Red Tornado. She’s probably still fuming from being with Lucy the night before and is itching to go all Holly Holm on the android. Tornado’s creator, Dr. T.O. Morrow is also on hand to control the robot’s movements in the what has got to be the world’s best video game simulator. The battle is probably the best super fight on the series so far, with Supergirl coming out on top after going all Bugs Bunny on the android before ultimately defeating him.

In fact, Supergirl beats Tornado so badly, she activates his emergency self-preservation protocols and flies off. Basically, Red Tornado flips a switch and can no longer be controlled by Morrow or the Army. Pissed that Supergirl has incapacitated their weapon (and likely wasted billions of dollars), the general chides Henshaw and fires Morrow on the spot.

Meanwhile, Cat is dealing with her mother’s not-so-passive aggressiveness by taking out her anger issues on Kara, who for the first time in forever, has had enough and finally gives Cat a piece of her mind!

Instead of firing her assistant, Cat is actually impressed by the outburst and decides to take Kara out for some good old fashioned day drinking. Believe it or not, the two actually begin to bond, and it’s great.

That evening, James is out to dinner with the Lanes, and the air is thick with tension. When Lucy excuses herself to go to the powder room, General Lane lays his cards out on the table. His problem with Jimmy isn’t his relationship with Superman (that’s likely his problem with Lois, though) it’s that he doesn’t think Jimmy is good enough for his little girl. It’s a dick move, but it resonates because deep down, James kind of agrees. Remember, he moved to National in the first place so he could be his own man.

When the three leave the restaurant, the Red Tornado shows up and intends to seek revenge by taking out the general. James stealthily flips the switch on his signal watch, but instead of calling on his best pal, it alerts Kara. Guess they reconfigured the watch after the text from Clark. Supergirl shows up just in time to stop the Tornado from killing the general, but not before it creates a cyclone to destroy an entire city block. Supergirl chooses to stop the cyclone instead of apprehending the android and he gets away.

In a nice scene between James and Kara, the two decide to channel their anger in more productive ways. James with a punching bag and Kara with a chained up automobile. And I am in awe that a superhero show on CBS went there in exposing the double standard that exists in society for how women and black men are allowed to show their anger.

Later, Alex has enlisted the help of Maxwell Lord in tracking the robot. And he deus ex machinas a way for the DEO to locate Dr. Morrow who had been manipulating the Tornado all this time. The DEO decides to set a trap for the Tornado while Alex locates Morrow and takes out the mad scientist while Supergirl takes out the android. However, when Alex kills Morrow, Red Tornado continues to function. It seems the android has gained sentience and is no longer linked to its creator. After learning that the android is sentient, Supergirl still kills it dead anyway. Has Kara never seen the Star Trek: TNG episode “Measure of a Man?”

I mean, the effect of seeing Supergirl’s hyper heat vision cross cut with memories of her leaving Krypton (which was the source of the “anger behind the anger”) was affecting, but I was disappointed to see her destroy Red Tornado so unequivocally.

Who knows? Maybe the android survived somehow? It did mysteriously regrow the hand that Kara had freeze-breathed off earlier in the episode, after all. Maybe Tornado can return and be a mentor figure to the SuperFriends Young Justice style?

At the end of the episode, Winn meets up with Alex and Kara to share some intel he’s dug up on the death of Daddy Danvers. Basically, Henshaw was the last person to see Danvers alive on a mission in South America and deleted any evidence that would explain how he died. And if it weren’t clear enough that Henshaw is bad news, his eyes get all red and glowy back at DEO HQ — he should be a little more discreet about that, btw.

If that weren’t all, Kara has somehow lost her powers. When Cat drops a glass in her office, Kara cuts herself and starts bleeding.

Was the glass made out of green meteor rock? Is there a red sun no one know about? Guess we’ll have to find out next week.

We’re not going to do this recap like past ones. Mainly because the last episode of Arrow, “Brotherhood,” aired two weeks ago. Also, because I’m not Connie, whose recap game is much stronger than mine, there probably won’t be any Hamilton references either. Instead, we’re just going to touch on the main points as we prep for the second half of the Flarrow crossover tonight.

I have to admit the memory’s a little fuzzy on some of the plot points. I know the ep cold opens on (another) late night truck hijacking. Instead of robbing the truck, H.I.V.E. — in a move straight out of Joker’s Dark Knight playbook — sets the money on fire.

Meanwhile, Team Arrow decides the best way to identify the DNA in Ghost tooth they found a few eps back is to infiltrate a H.I.V.E.-held lab and steal some tech. On the mission, one of the Ghosts gets a jump on Diggle, and it turns out the Ghost is his not-dead brother Andy. This would have been a more shocking surprise if they hadn’t spoiled the reveal in the preview.

This is the crux of the episode: Diggle’s inability to process the fact that his brother is still alive. The irony is that he isn’t the first person on the team to experience the resurrection of a sibling. Both Thea and Laurel have dealt with the realities of readjusting to the return of someone who was supposed to be dead. In fact, there’s a great scene between Laurel and Dig at a party about that very point.

Diggle and the rest of the team disagree on how to handle the news of Andy’s return. John wants to let him go and continue believing the brother he knew is “dead.” Ollie wants to go all in and rescue Andy from H.I.V.E. — since we learn that the Ghosts aren’t necessarily soldiers of their own volition.

Dig and Ollie also clash over other things throughout, including Ollie’s (dumb) plan to get into bed with Dahrk to take down H.I.V.E. from the inside. You see, earlier at the fundraiser, Dahrk approached Ollie and offered to form an alliance. Ollie thought this could be an opportunity to take down H.I.V.E. Ollie is wrong. Diggle even tells Ollie that the idea sounds as stupid as it did when he tried to do it with Ra’s last year. And he’s right.

In a gorgeously shot sequence (shout out to fight choreographer-turned-director James Bamford!) Team Arrow — and even the Atom — descend upon H.I.V.E.’s secret, uh, hive and superhero through corridors and hallways and elevators. It’s pretty thrilling.

Dig even shows up and delivers the best line of the night:

In the commotion, Dahrk tries to do his soul sucking thing on Thea, but it doesn’t work. Probably because she’s bathed in the Pit, and Dahrk’s “magic” is likely related to said Lazarus waters.

They eventually succeed in pulling Andy out of H.I.V.E. and lock him in a cell in the ArrowCave, but he still remains under Dahrk’s control. He even confirms John’s greatest fear: that he was never a good man and was a criminal mastermind all along. I still call B.S. on this development and think Dahrk is faking that business about Andy Diggle being a secret drug/arms dealer or whatever.

At the end of the episode, Ollie has decided to listen to Diggle (for once) and announces at a press conference that he’s going to go against the “Dahrk” forces that engulf Star City.

Also, there were flashbacks, but who cares?

Other title options: Ready to Hawk and Roll, Hawked and Loaded, Hawk of Ages, We Will Hawk You, Too Hawk Hawk Damn, and Drop It like It’s Hawk¹.

Before we begin… does Hawkgirl “claim” to be white? Uh oh, this is hawkward… but it wouldn’t be too surprising. (See Sandra Hawke, Sin, and Ra’s Al Ghul). I personally went through Kendra Saunders’ twitter history to read her tweets and reactions and responses to identifying as white. I urge others to do the same and form an opinion after seeing both sides.

Oooh! “And?” “And” is good.  We’re reminded of Barry and Oliver’s partnership, the fact that Wells-2 has been camping out in S.T.A.R. Labs because he’s supposed to be dead, and Ollie has an illegitimate Hawk(e)baby son.

Barry Allen is dealing with his PTZD (Post-traumatic Zoom Disorder) in a healthier way. Despite his Forrest Gump-ing around the city, he still hasn’t been able to reach his previous record of Mach 2 — 1,500ish mph and fast enough to time travel. Apparently, Zoom is 3-4 times faster than Barry is: does that mean Zoom is potentially a Mach 8 runner?! Holy shit, that’s over 6,100 mph.

Harry Wells hilariously starts listing reasons why Zoom may potentially be better than Barry, and Barry is just like, okay alright calm down if people don’t know they shouldn’t guess². He speeds off for his date with Patty, and SnoWells sigh and shrug and try to think of ways to pump up Barry’s speed. “Not everything,” Harry Wells says mysteriously like a mad scientist.

At the Central City docks, a stowaway with the most savage collection of knives hidden in a fancy coat murders an entire ship’s crew. To the extreme he throws his knives like a vandal. (Light up a stage and wax a chump like a candle). This man has magic, and he’s hunting for his prey.

The Vandal ends up at Jitters After-Hours where Cisco and Kendra are about to get to know each other even more personally after a few weeks of dating. Nothing like getting a knife thrown at your chest to kill the romantic vibes. (Please reread that and replace “romantic vibes” with “Romantic Vibe.” Thank you.)

Luckily, Cisco sent a distress signal to Barry and he’s fast enough to prevent The Worst Ending to a date Ever. Cisco in an adrenalized near-death moment of stupidity outs Barry’s identity in front of Kendra. Of course, she knows Barry; he’s at Jitters ordering his own namesake drink, like, every damn day.

Well, now Kendra knows so it’s okay for Barry to utilize all of the trick arrows in his quiver i.e. Oliver’s quiver. Is Barry’s decision to hide out in Star City for extra protection from the Green Arrow a latent low self-esteem reaction to his PTZD? Possibly. But magic is scary and this magic seems to be centuries old and now we get a crossover from it, so I accept it.

Cut to Star City and Team Arrow hijacking Darhk’s in-process hijacking. No Laurel, though. Hmmm… barely even any Iris from earlier, now that I think about it.  Where are my ladies at? Too many women to drive a male-centered show?

A flash of red flies by to sweep up Team Arrow before they get soul-sucked; Diggle is the last to get flashed in and promptly throws up on arrival. Yes. I love Flash!Diggle. I actually even love Flash!Thea who is trying not to fangirl over meeting The Flash.

Team Arrow brings Barry, Cisco, and Kendra, to the newly upgraded Foundry where Cisco beings to criticize every design mistake they’ve made. It’s nice to have some levity at Arrow HQ. We get some Barricity fanservice interaction where Felicity alternates hugging and berating Barry. (Damn, Felicity, what do you mean?)

Yes, superhero inside jokes. Yes. Yes yes yes. Keep them coming, show.

The lightheartedness doesn’t last long when Oliver chews Barry out for endangering Team Arrow by bringing Kendra + her mysterious stalker to Star City. There’s the Barry v Oliver power struggle I was anticipating. Felicity works her own superpower of calming Ollie down and suggests they all drink it up and chat, Avengers-style.

While Barry catches Felicity up to speed on the multi-verse situation and they theorize how Oliver-2 was probably pot-bellied and bald while simultaneously reminding me why Barricity is my guilty pleasure, Cisco begs Thea to change her superhero name. Thea, in turn, begs Cisco to cut his hair. I just love it all.

Vandal Savage literally crashes through the window of the party (insert my lazy Ultron joke here) and tries to knife everyone in sight. I cheered when Barry armed Oliver and the two of them justice-ed out sans supersuits.

It’s a fun scene until Thea “ends it” and shoots the Vandal extremely savagely between the eyes. It does nothing, however, because our heroes soon learn that Kendra’s stalker is Immortal.

Barry and Oliver are so in-sync. They both peer over the balcony looking for a body to clean up.. and find nothing. “Oh, boy,” they both breath out at the same time. God, I live for this super-bromance. It’s all I want from Clark and Bruce.

In Arrow HQ, Cisco decides to spill the beans about his meta-human powers to Kendra, you know, as you do after the third date. The awkwardness is buffered by the dramatic entrance of Merlyn Al Ghul and his dramatic information about Vandal Savage. Does it bother anyone else how reverent and inspired Merlyn sounds when he speaks of Vandal Savage’s immortality? It bother Kendra, and she flies out of the foundry to get a grip. Cisco follows her and tries to calm her down because, like he told Barry, he is so sprung on her. It lovely until Hawkman literally SWOOPS in. No really, Carter Hall aka Hawkman 100% non-figuratively flies down in a swooping trajectory and flies away with Kendra leaving Cisco alone. Sorry, Cisco, you can’t compete with reincarnated soulmates.

I’d like to encourage everyone to rewatch both parts of the Flarrow crossover and listen to the music score whenever the two Hawks are onsccreen; the characters and their scenes together combined with the ancient drumbeat soundtrack really make it a brand new show.

Carter/Khufu/Hawkman pauses the very, very, very important conversation with Kendra to handle bidniss aka deal with The Flash and the Green Arrow who are both currently gaining in on the Hawks. He hold up a finger like, “Gimme a sec, babe. BRB.”

First, Hawkman takes on Green Arrow. The hawk is a good fighter; a warrior. He returns the many arrows GA shoots at him and knocks the archer off his motorbike.

Barry charges in to save his BFF and  semi-boyfriend  and immediately get vertically dropped by Hawkman. Oliver sends one of his jettison arrows Barry’s way so that the Flash can zipline to him for a quick re-strategy session.They have a quick lover’s spat about listening to each other. Like a true couple, they throw back each other’s words in a later argument.

Barry funnel arms Hawkman out of the air while Oliver shoots away. Barry also gets to show off his new lightning-throw move that he picked up from Jay Garrick. Oliver is impressed. It pleases Barry.

Speaking of Jay Garrick, the Earth-2 speedster + Caitlin + Earth-2 Harry Wells have their own drama go down back at S.T.A.R. Labs. Patty Spivot breached Lab security — obviously — and shot Harry Wells because she thought that the Velocity-6 Speed Serum-gun he was holding was an actual weapon. It might be, according to Jay Garrick, but it wasn’t enough to defend himself against P. Spivvy’s bullet to his chest plate.

Damn, that was unexpected. Caitlin freaks, calls Jay, and temporarily speeds him up again so that he can phase his hand through Wells’ chest to retrieve the bullet remains. It’s nice that Jay does this for Harry despite their obvious beef. Maybe he did it for Caitlin? Or he did it because his heart is good since he is technically The Flash, too. Whatever the reason, the most important thing is that THERE IS A SNOWJAY V. SNOWELLS LOVE TRIANGLE BREWING WHO CARES ABOUT VELOCITY-6.

They chain Carter to a wall so that he doesn’t sprout wings anymore, but the Hawkman convinces them to help Kendra grow her own pair of wings… by getting her to “fall to her death.” Surprisingly, Barry is uneasy with the unorthodox plan and Oliver is the one supporting the illogical. I love role reversals. Carter give Kendra a little, ahem, nudge off the skyscraper, and Barry is there to save her when her wings most definitely do NOT emerge.

Guess what? Carter was right. Kendra needed to believe. She needed to believe that she could fly. She needed to believe that she could touch the sky. When she and Cisco are alone on the roof, she makes the leap of faith towards her destiny.

…and Cisco nearly vibes in his pants.

The situation seems hopeless, but Team Flarrow’s luck changes when they head back to Central City after tracking Vandal Savage on his way to retrieve an ancient relic Gandalf Staff. My suited-up justice bros walk into the church where Vandal is. Can I mention how cute Barry is when he complains to Oliver how slow they are? That’s some Justice League cartoon dialogue, and I’m all about it.

Before Vandal destroys my two idiots and the entire city with his Staff Relic thing… he sees Kendra flying. Or maybe he feels her flying. Either way, it’s creepy and obsessive and gross.

Thank god, because Vandal Savage seriously nearly-whopped Flarrow’s ass. They knew it too.

Super-Quick Things:

• Joe grinning like a cat who caught a canary (bird-joke) when Barry and Patty try to maintain professionalism at work instead of glomping each other’s faces like we know they want to.

• “I don’t get cold.” Oliver has zero patience for Barry’s supersuit inquiries.

• Cisco and Kendra force to Define The Relationship in front of The Flash and the Green Arrow.

• Caitlin and Harry Wells pow-wowing a superspeed serum with lots and lots of science talk. Science talk is foreplay for Caitlin Snow.
• Some Felicity Smoak appreciation. She always thrives in The Flash environment.

• “I am happy.” — Oliver Queen

• Oliver saying, “I was wrong” to Barry and then NOPING ON OUT OF THERE.
• Also, Oliver is the boyfriend of both Felicity and Barry. Let’s be real.

• Give me the Director’s Cut of this episode! There has got to be more Flarrow Party than what we saw air.
• This very very important gem:

• I wonder if Oliver will get his own Green Arrow coffee drink in Star City? Nah… but maybe a mixed cocktail?
• And then the end-tag connecting our two Flarrow-parts while also sending our Flarrow hearts racing: the potential Connor Hawke payoff from the first crossover.

As we know, Team Flarrow is trying to protect the Hawks from Vandal Savage, who wants to murder them because of destiny or habit or something. So everyone’s all teamed up, Kendra’s unlocked her hawking powers, and Oliver’s spotted his baby mama!

I’ve been so cautious this season, guys. Good things were happening. Oliver was LEARNING LESSONS. TEAM FLARROW WAS AWESOME. Despite some plot/exposition bumps, the team up in this half of the crossover was fun. There were things I wished for: Less Carter. ANY Snowlicity aside from their one nerd moment. Less white ancient Egypt (I’ll get on some of that later). But the Barry/Oliver moments were great — they’re wonderful foils for each other. As was anything with Cisco. Can he be my friend? Also he should be in every show. But just like we were burned last season with the Ra’s al Ghul arc, this Kid arc (I’ll come up with a better name for it another time) is only going to lead to terrible things. Unhappy fans. Annoyed fans.

Time to do that thing where I recap less and do more of split this episode into… THE GOOD and THE BAD! (You’re all meant to say it along with the text like on a game show.)

THE GOOD

So, seeing the team together? Great. They can barely fit in one farmhouse!

THE BAD

With the focus on the Hawks, there’s less time for Diggle or Thea or Caitlin or even Laurel to say… anything. I think our side characters got more to do in The Flash version of the episode, than the Arrow supporting cast did this week.

THE GOOD

Barry. Barry was wonderful this episode.

LOVE. SASSY. BARRY.

Barry and Oliver sticking together for the final moment of the battle was great. Like I said, they play off of one another well. Barry’s growth as a hero is apparent here, he’s less puppy and has more backbone (I guess Zoom breaking his back strengthened the bone…) to stand up to Oliver, tell him what is and isn’t going to work… He’s growing! (I can’t wait for the future crossover where Flash has grown even more and they are more toe to toe in planning and execution). He’s also a great friend, and he’s trying to keep up with everyone. There’s Cisco, there’s Oliver, there’s Felicity. He wants them all to work things out, but they’ve also got some people to save. He stretches a little thin, but he tries. Reason to love him.

MORE GOOD

Cisco! Who doesn’t want to date Cisco at this point? Besides his amazing one liners, his care for Kendra was really apparent. Something that I’m probably making up just now, but just go with it: Cisco is a namer of things. In order to do that, you have to consider what it is. You have to understand what makes a name work at its core. The reason he is so good at naming things is because he has this ability to understand things on a deeper level instantly. (Oh, of COURSE this ties back to his vibing powers, y’all). And he’s spent more time with Kendra than the other metas he’s named, so he knows just how to get her to unlock her powers. It probably won’t be for a while as her nurses this disappointment, but I hope Cisco finds someone one day. He so deserves it. But I am glad he got a love interest while it lasted.

Okay, this is the part where this devolves into only THE BADs. =/

THE BAD

I really dislike Carter. They’ve focused less on him in promo-ing Legends of Tomorrow, so hopefully he’s not around too much longer. I would love for Kendra to find herself without his assistance (he’s so pushy about it. “We like St. Roch, let’s go there.” Ugh no, what if she wants to stay in Central? Or back to Wisconsin?), especially since it’s been bad assistance so far and as Cisco mentions, she doesn’t even really seem to like him. In the present OR the past. So he’s out soon.

THE BAD

Briefly, this episode title was going to be “Not hubris. Hope,” because awesome line, awesome Barry. Alliteration. But then Oliver did what he did at the end, and it made this null and voice. Oliver’s hubris is going to be his downfall. He really thinks he can keep baby mama visits from Felicity? As she says in the episode, she does this kind of thing for a living. And we see that she’s suspicious. This episode does not leave us with hope. Even non-Olicity fans know that the backlash of this is going to be awful and devastating. Not hopeful at all! So I flipped it.

I could defend a lot of season 3; until the mess of the end, it felt like it was going somewhere, and it kind of got there with the beginning of season 4, even if the episodes prior were, like I said, a mess. But where do we go with this? I know everything going well isn’t going to last long, but this not only takes the character backwards, it spoils everything he does going forward. Heroes don’t lie to be selfish, if they must lie (secret identities and whatnot), it’s for the greater good. It’s to protect (even when it’s usually ‘it’s not protecting them either way to keep the secret’).

But here, Oliver’s lie doesn’t protect anything but himself. Yes, him being the Arrow makes his life crazy and not great for a young kid trying to get to know his dad, but Oliver is lying to the two most important people in his life (and also the rest of the important people of his team): Felicity and his kid. Neither one of them is going to be on his side later when he tries to explain things. Iris did it on The Flash, but she’s an angel we rarely see. See Thea. See Felicity’s own missing father issues. See John’s anger at his brother being alive. See anything with the Lances and lying. No one likes being lied to by someone they thought they could trust and trusted them. Oliver has too many examples of this kind of lying going badly for him to do it himself.  

Also, thanks for trusting your 10 year old fling with all of this, but NOT Felicity (or Diggle. I appreciate the Barry, but that’s only because Barry was stepping in it and wouldn’t let Ollie NOT tell him). Baby Mama lied to him and still isn’t letting him get to know him properly. Oliver doesn’t get enough out of this deal. Oliver get to know his son, but the kid doesn’t get to know his dad… He just knows this strange man who suddenly wants to hang out with him (that wasn’t creepy or concerning AT ALL). This is a one sided relationship full of lies that will not end well for anyone. Le sigh. You were going SO WELL with the character growth, Ollie.

I have a terrible sense of dread now. Both for the characters and the writing. Hubris. Not hope.

THE BAD

I don’t want to write a whole thing, because we’re all SO TIRED OF IT. But WHY OH WHY WAS ALL OF ANCIENT EGYPT WHITE EXCEPT FOR ONE PRIESTESS? Let’s not even go into the sort of fake Egypt they went through (I don’t feel like fact checking meteors and The Middle Kingdom). Or who Vandal was in Egypt and why he came for them in the first place? Was he actually in love with Kendra, or just sexually assault her? Or what kind of non-Egyptian name is VANDAL SAVAGE. Of course they’re not going to acknowledge their gross white washing, but Exodus came out and was panned and dragged and flopped all before this episode was written. I even think the Gods of Egypt backlash happened before this was probably written (though the producer’s ‘apology’ is recent).

But this is a comic book inspired story. PICK ANY FICTIONAL PLACE. Even with Ra’s al Ghul, fans (especially of color) were annoyed that Ra’s was cast as white. But Nanda Parbat is fictional and Ra’s is a title that Season 3 Ra’s likely inherited, so somewhere there was a PoC Ra’s to fit the culture he leads. But don’t pull the same crap with Egypt and expect no one to say anything. Next time, pick a fictional place. (Like, why was Carter an EGYPTIAN PRINCE…!? HOW SWAY? I can’t.)

Even with all of this… mess, the one liners and Barry and Cisco are the redeeming qualities. I think in future crossovers, I’d hope for a few things (besides singing. GIVE ME SINGING!):

• For the stories to be maybe set apart from either show’s continuity. The Flash did it better than Arrow, which spent so much time on The Kid, that it left little time for team integration and interaction. It’s hard when the episodes are set right before the mid-season finales, and in some ways I want the teams to influence the other stories, but this is a prime example of it sort of falling apart. There are too many characters to deal with. Also, when Barry’s advice is straight up ignored, it shows that these interactions aren’t having an influence on the other show’s stories, and that makes me sad. Because they can be fun on the outside, but if it has no meaning, then what’s the point? It should be fun and have a point.

• With that said, we have to figure out how to let these characters interact. I know the main focus is Ollie/Barry with some Felicity thrown in, because they are the initial crossover trio. But more John/Barry or John/Cisco. Even Laurel/Cisco like we saw last season briefly. SNOWLICITY PLEASE. Let’s get Iris in on this. Joe! Joe and Diggle need a brotha talk for real. “These crazy white people and their meta humans…” I want more TEAMWORK. As opposed to the two heroes just doing it all themselves.
• I suppose next season might be a huge thing with Legends of Tomorrow if it gets renewed for a second season. This is a cautionary tale on watching how many characters get squeezed into these episodes. Because I want to focus on our side characters in each show, not just the leads of all the shows.

• A story with characters that need less exposition. The Hawks needed a LOT of exposition, which I didn’t really care about. Give us a story we can just jump into. I don’t want to get to know new people in the crossovers, I want to have fun with the characters I already know (new villains are fine).

Flechettes:

• What if the funeral is for the kid…!?!?!?!?!?!?!? Especially after this character betrayal, it’s the only logical option for the show to not lose a cast member AND for why Barry shows up.

• (If Felicity died, Barry wouldn’t be late to the burial. If Diggle died, he honestly would have less of a need to show up at all, especially when dealing with his own crap. I doubt we’d say Oliver would go to Caitlin’s funeral, just to make a parallel of characters who rarely speak to each other right now.)
• Whatcha doing, Malcolm? You seemed ALL FOR Team Flarrow taking out Savage. Why did you suddenly change your mind? What is up with you? Also, this is the one time in this crossover he didn’t roll seven deep with Shadows behind him.
• I was surprised not to see Ray at all here, since other episodes of Arrow didn’t care about squeezing in LoT characters to see them rotate around each other pre-spinoff.
• TROLLS. I can’t believe these trollololling writers did an Age of Ultron thing. It was funny, but also: who’s house is this? Why are they here, still in Central City apparently? I guess outside the city limits but still.
• Also, the 600 miles or so (from Barry zooming from one city to another in The Flash pilot, was that the distance?) between Star and Central Cities is way too long for these back and forths. They couldn’t have taken Felicity’s jet?

• This line was golden and I loved it.
• Barry and Cisco really saved this episode.

• When Kendra’s wings sprout in Timeline 1, THERE’S NO HOLE IN HER JACKET. HOW DO THE WINGS WORK?
• Barry runs a side business now:

• While I am team:
  

I was a little annoyed at how little time Felicity gave Oliver in Timeline 1. He DID need time to process, but he also did need to tell her the truth.

• “That’s staff’s gonna go from “Can’t Touch This” to “Invisible Touch.”
• I think Vandal Savage is Sailor Saturn??? He has a staff with the power to destroy worlds (really surprised he hasn’t used it more recently, considering how willy nilly he is with the thing.) Savage basically:

• Welp, everyone dies. Moral of this episode, if Oliver lies to Felicity, everyone dies. Hubris, not hope.
• Why did we need to see that Baby Mama reads magazines about Mindy Kaling tho? lol
• Why does Laurel get deja vu when she wasn’t even there the first time?

• The episode where Oliver gets to hug two of the most important people in his life, is the episode where he deserves it the least. That bosom hug is SPOILED.
• Eternally facepalming as Oliver’s regression.

Okay. Well, this episode mimicked Flash brightness (The Flash, in turn, had a purposefully Arrow darkness about it, they spent each episode majority in the opposite hero’s city), but The Flash half was more fun, for sure. Next week is the mid-season finale. I am not hopeful about it.

What were your thoughts? Comment or tweet me @ConStar24

Last night’s Into the Badlands — clunkily titled “Two Tigers Subdue Dragons” and not to be confused with this — was tasked with propelling us into the end of the season. In addition to a promised Baron v Baron showdown, the episode was the first to effectively use an episode-ending cliffhanger to guarantee viewers will tune in for the final two entries of its debut season. But did it deliver?

The ep opens with a bloodied Tilda running through the woods, and at first I thought maybe it was a flashback. Turns out that she was doing her mother’s bidding and luring some of Jacobee’s men into a Butterfly Warrior ambush. After killing them, the Widow decapitates one of Quinn’s clippers with Jacobee’s weapon of choice, the pickaxe. And it’s clear that Widow is a way better supervillain than Quinn.

At the Fort, Sunny and M.K. are in full-on Mr. Miyagi mode, training the young colt in the martial arts. Much like Daniel-san, M.K. is a little too hot-headed to listen to his sifu. And Sunny puts him on his ass.

To be honest, the kid isn’t endearing himself to twitter so much either.

Later that evening, M.K. starts practicing on his own and even considers cutting himself to unleash his superpowers. Sunny sees this from a distance and decides it’s time to step in and fix him once and for all. In another training session — in a far away location, Sunny unleashes the monster when he cuts M.K. on the cheek. Super Saiyan M.K. proceeds to force push Sunny to the ground before passing out himself. Sunny’s point was to teach M.K. how to be in control when his powers take over. This will be important later.

Meanwhile, Jade is having her own battle with Lydia over who gets to sleep with Quinn. Seriously, I don’t understand why so many people give a shit about Quinn. Not only do these two women fight over him, but I still don’t get Sunny’s allegiance to his baron. At some point, the ones who are supposed to be the protags need to turn on a character as despicable as Quinn or I’m gonna lose patience.

Speaking of Quinn, he’s still being treated by Veil for his tumor. She can’t do much for him because the only doctor in the Badlands who knows how to treat cancer is dead. Thanks, Quinn. Later, M.K. comes to Veil for more info on the book he stole because he believes it reveals a way out of the Badlands. Sunny is pissed because he thought M.K. already knew this. Sunny decides he needs to find another way out.

Back in the Butterfly lair, Tilda finds an antique record player, and the girls listen to the first music they’ve ever heard. Widow is a party pooper and breaks the record player while reminding Tilda she’s a sexual abuse survivor and doesn’t have time for such frivolity.

The Clippers end up agreeing to the parlay with Jacobee’s men and meet up in a cemetery. It’s refreshing to see there are black men in the future world of the Badlands. I hope Jacobee — played by Edi Gathegi, aka Darwin from X-Men: First Class — gets to stick around and become a major player (because we all know how well X-Men treated him). Also, his Clipper force is definitely the best dressed in the Badlands.

Tilda shows up incognito and triggers a battle between the two barons’ forces when she throws a pickaxe — which we remember is Jacobee’s signature move — at Quinn. Sunny catches it in time, but not before all hell breaks out and it’s full on Warriors vs. Clippers at the Staples Center. Meanwhile, M.K. spots Tilda and they throw down as well.

We also learn Jacobee’s regent Zypher is actually in cahoots with the Widow. The two badass ladies even try to sucker Ryder into joining their alliance, which he totally will, and then get got in the finale. I’m guessing.

After much blood is shed, the barons realize they were being set up by the Widow. Whether or not this means they’ll be teaming up is another story. On the other side of the cemetery, Tilda cuts M.K. and she witnesses him hulk out for the first time. M.K. is about to crush Tilda’s throat when his training kicks in and he’s able to control his rage.

After the battle, Sunny goes down to the docks to meet the River King (more black people in the Badlands!) for safe passage out for himself and his companions. The King isn’t trying to hear it though because he only agreed to meet Sunny as a favor for Waldo (Stephen Lang’s character and Sunny’s mentor).

River King is also pissed because the last time he had a shipment of cogs come through, someone murdered all of the passengers on board. He shows Sunny a wanted poster of the perp, and wouldn’t ya know, it’s M.K. The only way Sunny can get access to the King’s ships is by murdering his own sidekick. And we have our first interesting plot twist all season.

Full disclosure: I wasn’t really looking forward to last night’s Supergirl. After the big cliffhanger in last week’s excellent entry into the season — in which Kara cuts herself on a piece of glass, demonstrating her loss of powers — I was disappointed the show was already going the no powers route so soon. This trope gets explored in nearly every iteration of the Superman/Supergirl story. But boy was I wrong! “Human For a Day” might be my favorite episode so far!

Before we get to the big reveal at the end — and why this ep is tops in my book — let’s start at the beginning. And by beginning, I mean the end of last week’s episode. If you recall, Supergirl channeled all of her rage and fury into her final battle with Red Tornado. Letting out the biggest heat vision blast she’d ever unleashed to straight blow the (ahem, now sentient) android to smithereens.

In doing so, Kara completely drained her solar battery, and will require several days to recharge. She learns this is the case after a series of DEO tests and an exposition dump from her hologram mother. Basically, the writers have incorporated the New 52 Superman’s “Solar Flare” abilities into the show. Jimmy/James even name-checks the ability in a conversation with Kara. You see, Clark loves naming his powers the way Cisco loves to name metahumans.

Because she’s no longer blessed with godlike powers, Kara gets a day off from superheroing. Because she’s no longer invincible, she is now susceptible to the common cold and also gets the day off from CatCo too! But instead of getting the chance to Ferris Beuller around town, National City gets struck by one of the worst earthquakes in history (did Malcolm Merlyn have anything to do with it?)

It really is super bad timing for an earthquake of that magnitude because the DEO is in the middle of interrogating another Fort Rozz detainee. This one, though, is probably the most recognizable inmate to appear on the show. In rather impressive creature makeup, the Saturnian Jemm is being questioned by Henshaw and crew.

If you’re unfamiliar, Jemm has played a key role in several DC Comics stories, but is probably best known as a character most associated with Martian Manhunter. This will be significant later. In the comics, Jemm is usually portrayed as a good guy, but similar to Red Tornado before him, he’s a straight up villain on Supergirl. Like the Justice League’s resident Martian, Jemm has telepathic abilities, so the DEO has to neuter them by placing him in a giant glass tube. Of course, the earthquake knocks out the power at the DEO — you’d think they’d have back up generators considering who’ve they have locked up — and Jemm escapes.

Henshaw sends a task force equipped with inhibitors to counteract Jemm’s psychic powers and capture the alien. Alex wants to go but is ordered to stay behind and monitor the situation. The main reason Alex wants to lead the search party is because last time Hank led an expedition to hunt an alien, everybody but him ended up dead. I’m saying she has trust issues.

Back above ground, Kara and Jimmy are dodging flying debris and runaway cars, and just general chaos a midst the earthquake aftermath. Kara even breaks her arm after Jimmy saves her from getting hit by a car. Honestly, I think it’s just an excuse for Jimmy to take off his shirt.

With the city in chaos — and Supergirl nowhere in sight — Maxwell Lord uses the opportunity to sow more seeds of doubt in the public’s opinion of their superhero. How very Luthor of you, Max.

Kara and Jimmy confront Maxwell about his PR stunt, and he reveals that he knows about Supergirl’s solar flare. He even intimates that she’s taking longer than Superman to recharge and that she might be permanently powerless. Kara doesn’t respond well to being a damsel in distress and decides to be proactive, even without powers. When Jimmy notices looters taking advantage of a convenience store, Kara changes into her Supergirl outfit (how, I don’t know?) to stop the bad guys.

Back at the DEO, Alex is fed up with staying back in the control room, especially when she sees that the agents that accompanied Hank on the search for Jemm are now dead. So she recruits another agent to join her track down Jemm on their own. They find him, but not before the alien is able to mind control the other agent. She’s about to be shot when Henshaw tackles her into another room, saving her life.

Alex, though, is none too grateful about the save and begins berating Henshaw. She unloads on him and even admits the source of her distrust: she thinks Henshaw had something to do with her father’s death. She handcuffs Hank to a pipe in the wall and tells him she’s going after Jemm, but Hank implores that she needs his help and that he isn’t the enemy. When Alex finds Jemm, she’s able to dislodge the Mind Stone from his forehead, but the alien is undeterred. Just as he’s about to deliver the killing blow,  scaffolding crushes him and we see Hank is not only free of his handcuffs, but he’s still saving Alex’s life.

At CatCo, Kara and Jimmy are bonding over abandonment issues when Winn walks in and gets his heart broken.

But there’s no time for soap operatics because there’s a gas leak on a higher floor of their building and CatCo employees can’t get out. Kara’s powers still haven’t returned so Jimmy plays the hero and climbs a ladder in the elevator shaft to help his co-workers. When he falls, though, Kara’s powers instantly return and she swooshes down to save him. All she needed was an adrenaline surge to reinstate her powers, and Jimmy’s near-death experience was the catalyst.

With Supergirl returned, she’s able to help all of the  National citizens trapped in the earthquake, and prove Maxwell Lord wrong once again. But really, all we care about is how Hank Henshaw got out of those handcuffs, and what’s the deal with his glowing eyes?

Well, because the Supergirl writers have no intention of slowing down, we get the reveal of the season. Henshaw and Alex have a heart to heart about the day her father died. She was right about the mysterious circumstances. Henshaw and Danvers were indeed hunting an alien in the jungles of South America. When the two finally came upon their prey, Jeremiah had a change of heart because he knew that the alien wasn’t a threat, and ultimately gave his life to protect said alien. That said, Henshaw didn’t survive the encounter either. The only survivor was the alien and he only looks like Henshaw because he’s a shapeshifter.

And if you haven’t guessed, that alien isn’t Hank Henshaw, but J’onn J’onzz!

Let’s watch that again (and again), but in gif form.

Holy shit. Not since Smallville have we seen live action Martian Manhunter action! And once again, he’s played by a Black man! But what do we have to do to get a cape on these characters? They forgot Tornado’s last week, and J’onn doesn’t have his this week!

Remember when we called on WBTV to give Martian Manhunter his own show? Well, they kinda just did! And just like that David Harewood’s character went from being my least favorite to the one I can’t wait to see more of going forward! And according to this interview, they’ll be exploring J’onn’s background even more later this season!

You won’t see how he ended up on Earth, but you will see flashbacks to his family, to how they died, which was a very emotional episode for me. It was around the same time as those terrible attacks in Paris. It was just emotional, the idea that people want to kill others. In our story, and it’s in the comic books, there are two Martian races — there are the Green Martians, which J’onn is a member of, and there are the White Martians. The White Martians exist purely to kill Green Martians. They burn them. They literally put them in furnaces. Playing that on the day was really emotional for me to think that we live on a planet where we kill each other. It was wonderful playing that with Chyler. Hopefully that will be another great episode. J’onn feels deeply that he’s the last Martian. He’s the last of his kind, the only Green Martian left in history.

You guys, we’re getting live action White Martians!

The CW pulled out the big guns for The Flash’s second mid-season finale: Mark Hamill’s return as the Trickster, Captain Cold, and… Wally West? Yes. Wally Freaking Kid Flash West is in this episode, and he’s beautiful. I mean, it’s beautiful. Yeah. That’s what I meant. Anyways, happy holidays and speed onward to read onward!

Flashforward… Maybe? Wells is being chased by Zoom. And it’s sexy. I mean awesome. Why isn’t Zoom just murdering the sexy out of him already? Ohhh… They’re “talking.” Harry just keeps begging for his daughter Jesse’s life, not his. Oh Wells… you’ve revealed your cards. Zoom is totally going to use that to string you like a puppet. Zoom just “smiles,” if you can call it that because the zoom costume and mask is like a creepy grinning abyss of evil.

Wells chokes out at Zoom to just say something! Zoom replies: “Merry Christmas.” Oh really, it’s gonna be like that, huh?

Papa Joe and Iris shop for Christmas gifts together, and then they get Flash coffee drinks afterwards. It’s so cute. Papa Joe ponders what he’s going to get Barry because he’s the best papa in the world and wants to get him something really, really good considering all of the bullshit. He also mentions to Iris that he misses Eddie, too, because he’s the best papa in the world. It’s a quick moment of support and reassurance, but it’s lovely.

Barry and Patty snuggle before being interrupted by a “happy-for-Barry” Iris. I really do believe she’s happy for him; I really do feel like they’re building the platonic relationship between WestAllen… they’re giving a reason for us to root for them rather than forcing us to accept their destiny as a couple. It reminds me of Clark and Lois in Smallville… but that’s another story for another time. But it’s a visually and emotionally gorgeous WestAllen scene.

For them, Christmas is Truthmas considering that Barry admitted his less-than-brotherly feelings to her one year ago. So Iris confides in Barry that she’s been harboring a family secret, and it’s a good one: Francine was pregnant when she left. She kept the baby. She named the baby “Wally.”

I screamed. I scared my entire family. “Wally West.”

SnowJay is still trying to figure out how to close breaches like some weird science-y foreplay. Cisco simultaneously ships and abhors SnowJay. Is Meta-Cisco how the audience feels? We knew they were gonna get together; just do it! I wonder how Cisco would feel about SnoWells.

Jay Garrick does this thing that he probably thinks is hilarious where he says, “What’s Christmas?” He does this several times a day, I think. Like a bad Dad Joke.

The snowstorm (a literal snowstorm and not Caitlin/Ronnie’s ‘ship name) is getting stronger outside, and we learn that it’s because of the Weather Wizard! Oh, that makes sense. He breaks into Iron Heights to break out Captain Cold and Jesse James, aka The Trickster.

“It’s official, Santa hates us,” Joe exhales when he finds out about the trio of missing meta-villains. Joe warns Barry about Patty flipping her lid over Wizard because he’s kind of the whole reason that her dad died and she became a cop.

She freezes Barry out like an angsty teenager: “YOU WOULDN’T UNDERSTAND OKAY? OKAAAY?”

The three rogues chat in an abandoned toy factory, because, you know, villain-ing. Wizard thinks that they are the perfect team to defeat The Flash… like the Death-to-Flash Powerpuff Girls. Cold, thankfully, thinks he’s an idiot.

West Family Meeting: Iris tells Papa Joe about Wally West’s existence. It takes a lot for Iris… she believed that she was purposefully lying and hurting her father. I want to give her a hug. And then Joe loses it when he learns his son’s name is “Wallace.” He cries. I cry. He leaves to go to work, but you can tell he’s not angry at Iris. If anything, he’s angry with himself; Joe West is basically a perfect human being and the thought of him being a less-than-perfect father to a son (whether or not he knew the son existed) is soul-crushing to him. I love Joe West.

Barry and Iris head to the West house and are Bad Guy Greeted by Leonard Snart/Captain Cold sitting by the fireplace sipping hot cocoa. Cold complains about the West house’s lack of mini marshmallows… perhaps Linda Park used them all while stress-baking.

Barry gets a little too up in Cold’s face because I think he secretly is a Snarry shipper like “YOU COME TO MY HOUSE?!” He tips Barry off about the new Wizard/Trickster collabo. Barry is like “AWWWWW, YOU’RE A MARSHMALLOW” and Cold is like, “SHUT UP NO I’M NOT YOU ARE.” Cold leaves, but not before telling his boyfriend, “Merry Christmas.”

Joe is struggling with the idea that he’s a terrible father. He feels guilty that his Daddy-Sixth-Sense didn’t go off? It’s terribly illogical and sweet. Breathe in, breathe out. Must not cry while typing this recap.

Trickster hijacks Central City’s airwaves. I appreciate that superhero cities are always tuned into local TV channels rather than, you know, CNN. Cisco super-zooms in on a reflection of a giant Jiggle Wiggle teddy bear on Mark Hamill’s eyeball. It’s a way-too-easy, nearly lazy trope to find out the bad guy’s location, but I let it slide only because Harrison Wells says, “Jiggle Wiggle” in his throaty Earth-2 voice.

For some reason, Patty beats the Flash to the toy factory where SINGING SPINNING DREIDEL EXPLOSIVES spin towards them. I was informed that it was a nod to Hamill’s voice character, Hanukkah Zombie. Last year, Vader reference and this year Futurama. Hamill is so down.

Barry tells P. Spivvy to hug her, to which she replies, “I’m seeing someone.” Amazing! I love that she is awkward in the face of death. Anyways, Barry funnel arms the two of them through the roof. Like a Hover-Flash. He flew. To quote Oliver Queen, “That’s new.”

Zoom somersaults through the breach to check-in with Wells. This is the part where I realize that THIS PLOTLINE IS CURRENT. The intro wasn’t a flashforward?! I’m distraught. That is why Team Flash keeps asking Harry what’s up you good and he’s non-answering with, “Why wouldn’t I be?” UM, BECAUSE ZOOM IS BLACKMAILING YOU TO BETRAY US ALL. JUST TELL THEM, WELLS-2!

Oh, and because Trickster is seriously insane and demented, he pretends to be Santa and hands out beautifully wrapped bombs to the children who sit in his lap. I shudder to think what he did to the actual Santa that was hired by Central City for the tree-lighting ceremony.

Barry corners Weather Wizard on a roof, flourishing Cisco’s Weather Wand (intended to destroy Mardon, not give him more power). He tries to explain what it does, but Wizard gets bored mid-speech and flies off the roof. Something about changing the atmospheric pressure and… oh nope. He’s just flying we’re all just gonna accept that he’s flying.

Once he stops jumping off of helicopter propellers, Flash is blackmailed to hand over the wand to the Wizard so that Trickster won’t detonate all of the wrapped bomb-gifts.

Alright, firstly,  that wand shouldn’t even work! You can’t just pass off a wand, you need to win it in a battle and earn it… don’t they know wand-lore? That’s why Draco was the master of the Elder Wand when he disarmed Dumble– okay sorry, the Potter freak in me just unleashed.

Luckily, the combined brainpower of Wells, Garrick, and Cisco fabricate another TV-science plan with magnets and a drone to send all 100 gift-bombs through the breach to Earth-2. Like Grodd. Damn, eff Earth-2, apparently.

Barry takes out the two rogues, but then Patty Spivot shows up and takes out Flash. She’s making me unlike her. She is about to shoot Wizard point black to avenge her dad… Trickster episodes are always full of Father Issues. Barry talks to her and convinces her to put the gun down, kind of the way Supergirl did in National City last night. It’s what makes superheroes heroes.

After everyone is re-arrested, Joe finds Barry to tell him that he’s resolved most of his issues because he is a perfect man and really, really good at being a rational human. He’s released his pain and made room in his heart. Room for another West! Joe’s also found a Christmas present for Barry: his heirloom watch.

Because Joe is the perfect papa and inadvertently gave Barry excellent father-son advice, Barry speaks to Harrison Wells-2 through glass where he’s working. He decides to forgive him… or the other him.

“I know that you’re not him, but he’s not here and I have to say this. For me.”

Barry has recognized in himself that he won’t be happy until he finds it in his heart to forgive Harrison Wells, the murder of his mother and friends. So he forgive him. Through the glass. Harry notices Barry staring at him and crying beautifully; he politely and cooly asks Barry if he needed to tell him something, and Barry fumbles and ends up asking Harry out instead. Not really, but Barry invites Harry to the Christmas party at his house!

Annual West Family Christmas Party! SnowJay kisses underneath the mistletoe as everyone peeks over their mugs of spiked hot cocoa to watch it happen. Patty and Barry make up with dorky, ugly sweaters. The doorbell rings and Barry hopes it’s Harry. It’s not… it’s Wally. Wally West. You know, Kid Flash? Joe West made some beautiful humans. The Wests invite this other new West inside and we all just stare at the TV with our jaws hanging open waiting for January 19.

Post-Credits Tag:

Another Zoom and Harry meet-up. Harry Wells divulges that he’s figured out Zoom’s plan: Zoom is sending Earth-2 assassins to level Barry up and increase his powers. Harry understands that Zoom wants Barry to be as strong as he could be… just so that Zoom could suck the Speed Force from him to become even more powerful.

Zoom basically responds, “Yeah, so what?”

He then teases Wells with a Jesse QUICK hug from his daughter before taking her away. The little reunion is enough to fuel Harry’s desperation, and he agrees to help Zoom.

First Wally and now Jesse? The second half of this season is going to have ALL THE SPEEDSTERS.

Super-Quick Things:

• Joe West is not a fan of Green Arrow.

• “Every Earth has The Godfather, Vito.”

• I wonder if someone actually wrote all of the Christmas Trickster lyrics, or did Hamill improv them himself?
• It is Flarrow-verse canon that Iris and Barry stole Joe’s convertible when they were younger and crashed it. This is a flashback I need.

• This Cold/Iris interaction almost makes up for the fact that Iris only had one line in the Flarrow crossover. Almost.

• The mug that Captain Cold is using…

• I want this ornament, Santa.

• Caitlin is healing from Ronnie’s “death.” It’s why she allows herself to move on to Jay Garrick.

• Also, I’ll leave this here. Just because it’s so necessary:

That’s it until January.

Because this recap is a week late (sorry, got distracted writing on twitter about a different rich, blonde, white guy who learns the ways of the Orient and returns a superhero) and because I’m just filling in, my recap of the Arrow winter finale, titled “Dark Waters,” will follow a different format. Rather than just giving a play-by-play of what happened in the ep, I wanna spend extra time on two aspects of the show and its fandom that needs to be discussed. And of course we will talk about that ending.

For a quick synopsis of the episode, Ollie is holding a campaign event at Star City Bay when a drone starts opening fire on the crowd. Team Arrow saves the day (in their civvies) and Ollie suspects Damien Darhk is behind the attack. The team decides the best way to retaliate is to put Darhk’s business out in the open so they hold a press conference naming Darhk as the supervillain that he is. And in true supervillain fashion, Darhk and his H.I.V.E. minions crash the Queen campaign’s holiday party like a scene out of The Dark Knight.

Oliver gets knocked out and when he comes to, he learns H.I.V.E. has kidnapped Diggle, Thea, and Felicity (fortunately, Laurel was on other business during the party so she can save the day later). Ollie agrees to Dahrk’s demands and is taken to H.I.V.E.’s secret lair. There he finds his three friends placed in a fucking gas chamber. Before they suffocate to death, Black Canary and Merlyn (dressed as the Arrow) arrive in the nick of time. Merlyn shoots Darhk with an explosive arrow and it explodes! So Damien’s dead, right? Later, Team Arrow is prepped to celebrate the holidays in peace now that Damien Dahrk is smithereens. Ollie even proposes to Felicity.

But Darhk is actually alive and has put a hit out on Ollie. In an ending reminiscent of the season three finale of Smallville, the scene cuts back and forth between Dahrk’s celebratory Christmas and his goons gunning down Olicity. The episode ends with Oliver holding Felicity’s bullet-riddled and dying body.

Okay, so I lied about not giving a play-by-play. But I wanted to give proper context before drilling down to two specific aspects of the show (and its fandom) that was exposed as a result of the events of this episode.

Firstly, this show has an annoying habit of fridging many of its female characters, which is ironic and disappointing because there are so many really great women on the show. But since season one, the Arrow writers have used the women in Ollie’s life as mere plot devices to motivate the main male hero (or villain) and move the story forward. Think Sara or Shado or Helena or Sara again or Thea or Moira… the list goes on.

This episode was most egregious because of the scene in Damien Dahrk’s gas chamber. Nevermind the fact that the episode went out of its way to remind us of Felicity’s Jewish heritage, but to have her literally placed in a gas chamber? Seriously? Plus, if the anvil wasn’t clear enough, they had Damien do a Nazi joke.

But the thing that irks me the most about how Arrow treats most of the women on the show is that it’s completely unnecessary! Time and again, the women have proven to be more than capable of holding their own. Take Sara, for example. In the pilot, she was just a plot device. The “other woman” to show the audience how callow pre-island Ollie was with his relationship with Laurel. Then they “killed” her so to give Ollie pathos. Fortunately, they brought Sara back (as Caity Lotz) and gave the character her own motivation and agency and it was awesome! Then they “killed” her again.

I suspect the shooting of Felicity is being positioned in much the same way. Ollie is going to rededicate himself to the cause of being Arrow because of her death, which I also suspect will be temporary. After spending so many seasons pandering to them, I highly doubt Arrow is going to piss off that part of its fandom.

Even Thea, who has evolved a lot as a character since season one, is constantly being “protected” by her father and her brother. Nevermind the fact that, as Speedy, she’s proven to be their equal in battle, and then some. To continually use Thea as a damsel in distress is not only insulting, it’s nonsenscial given her superheroing experience.

Still, despite all of these missteps, I was grateful to see that the writers remembered that they had another female character who could help offset some of these tired tropes.

I’ve gone on record as being a big fan of the Laurel Lance character on the show. I usually feel like I’m in the minority since she has her share of detractors on twitter, and the internet in general. But I’ve always felt that the show has been about Black Canary’s hero journey as much as it has been about Green Arrow’s. And that has never been clearer than in this episode.

For one, throughout “Dark Waters,” Laurel is the lone voice of reason. She’s the one that reminds Ollie to be rational after the Ghosts attack the party. She’s the one of the only ones to remain unconvinced of Darhk’s demise. When she learns about her father’s dealings with Dahrk, she doesn’t berate him or drag it out into another source of drama. In fact, the best scene of the whole episode (season?) is when Lance sees his daughter save the day and says, “I guess you don’t need anyone’s protection.”

What is unfortunate, though, is that the episode that really lets Black Canary shine is the same one that will only be remembered for “killing” Felicity. And that’s kind of Arrow fandom in a nutshell. It’s like you can’t build one of them up without tearing the other one down.

And look, I get it. That’s what fandom is. You pick your team and cheer for them while you boo the other one. It’s what makes sports fun. If you’re a Red Sox fan, your job is to hate the Yankees. I get it. But even then, there’s a level of toxicity that can be damaging and unpleasant.

Fans who stan for Laurel get ridiculed for it. Olicity shippers get badmouthed and accused of not being “real fans” because they’re “ignorant of the comics,” which has been a bludgeon against “fake geek girls” for decades. What’s even worse is that some of this fan hate extends beyond the characters and to the actresses themselves. It’s all crazy!

Why can’t we be fans of both characters? Sure, Laurel makes boneheaded decisions sometimes, but so does Oliver. Remember, this show is about their evolution into the JLA stalwarts that we all know and love. Their flaws are what make these characters interesting. As for Felicity, who cares if she isn’t Oliver’s love interest in the comics? I haven’t always been the biggest fan of their romantic pairing, but that has more to do with how it has affected the character and less about rooting for any particular ‘ship.

Point is, Arrow has the potential to be an even greater showcase for women superheroes, but it shouldn’t rest on its laurels (pun intended) and should strive to be better in how it handles these characters. Between both Canaries, Speedy, Nyssa, and Felicity, Arrow could be one of the most feminist superhero shows out there. It just needs to try harder.

Continuing our recap catch up, the penultimate episode of Into the Badlands was clearly the most interesting of the season. And that’s too bad because after this weekend’s season finale, we don’t if AMC will be bringing the show back for a second one. We hope so since all the pieces are finally in place for an epic showdown between good, evil, and everything in between.

We begin atop the Fort and in the middle of another Sunny/M.K. training sequence. This time, the young colt has had enough of his mentor’s pushiness and Super Saiyans Sunny off the wall! Before our hero plummets to his death, Sunny wakes up in bed next to Veil in a cold sweat. I guess Clippers can have nightmares too. He begins to flip through the stolen Book of Azra and finds an opening that fits his compass. When he places it inside, the needles begins whirling like mad.

Later, Jade makes her first Machiavellian move as the new baroness by convincing Quinn to let her train the Clippers — and even Lydia — to be poppy harvesters. You see, when Widow attacked the baron, she also freed all of his slaves cogs so no one is left to tend to the crops. Tell me again why the Widow is the bad guy? [Hint: she isn’t.]

At the same time, Quinn is rallying his troops to war against the Widow when he has another debilitating headache. It seems the tumor is only getting worse, despite Veil’s medical treatment. Before he goes to see his doctor, he tells Jade to lead his men. Because Jade’s bad like that. Later, as he’s being tended to by Veil, he tells her that Sunny was the one who murdered her family. Whether she believes Quinn is left unresolved. I’d like to think she’s smarter than that. Let’s hope the writers feel the same way.

Back at the Butterfly camp, Tilda and the Widow (who I learned is named Minerva, though I’m not sure if she knows how to transfigurate) discuss M.K. and why she’s been after him this whole time. It turns out that Minerva was able to translate most of the Azran book and learned that M.K.’s superpower is actually killing him.

With this news, Tilda finds M.K. in the woods to tell him about what she’s learned. Unfortunately, Sunny catches them in the act and — despite M.K.’s disapproval — proceeds to take Tilda back to the Fort as the Clippers’ prisoner. One of the Colts who came along starts getting in her face, mocking her, until Tilda goes Mike Tyson on dude’s ear.

We learn some more about Azran mythology when Ryder visits his grandfather who happens to be some New Age-y mystic high priest who lives in a remote part of the Badlands. Ryder shows his grandfather M.K.’s pendant and asks about the city depicted on it. The priest — played by sci-fi vet Lance Henriksen –tells him not to worry about it because it’s just an old fable about paradise. After Ryder leaves, though, the priest assembles his men to seek out the “Dark One” among the Baron’s people.

Back in the dungeons, Sunny is about to torture Tilda to get info on the Widow’s whereabouts. Again, M.K. is not happy about this and pleads for mercy. Turns out Sunny didn’t need to torture her because the Widow shows up and it leads to this:

While Sunny and Widow throw down, M.K. is able to release Tilda from her chains but not before the one-eared Colt locks him in the cage and starts kicking the shit out of Tilda. Of course, this doesn’t bode well for the asshole Colt because M.K. cuts himself and lets out the beast, Force-pushing his brethren into a spike that impales him. Oh, young love.

Sunny is temporarily distracted by the commotion, and in that instant the Widow grabs her daughter and flees the dungeon. As M.K. lies passed out on the floor, we see Quinn stalking in the background. I guess he knows about M.K. now?

Still playing catch up on our recaps, but I didn’t want to go into the holiday break without talking about what was easily the best episode of Supergirl to date. And that’s saying a lot considering how much I enjoyed the last episode. But the mid-season finale — called “Hostile Takeover” — took things to a whole new level and I can’t wait to see what they have in store once 2016 rolls around! Not to mention the fact that NOC-favorite Lexi Alexander will be helming an ep in the new year.

The finale kicks off mere moments after the events of the previous episode. If you recall, Supergirl encounters her Aunt Astra and her Kryptonian goons on a rooftop in National City. This time, her evil aunt is brandishing the Kryptonite blade she took off Henshaw way back in Episode II: Attack of the Helgrammite. The baddies are able to do this because they’ve fashioned anti-Kryptonite devices to wear on their suits. Supergirl is able to eventually break free but not before Astra gives here a Darth Vader-esque “join me and together we shall rule the galaxy” type speech.

Homicidal alien aunties isn’t the only thing Kara has to worry about. At work the next morning, CatCo is in crisis (on infinite computers) mode after Cat’s personal emails have been hacked and released to the media including the Daily Planet. Cat has a team of lawyers on it, but eventually turns to the Super Friends (Kara, Winn, James) to handle it.

But to be honest, the computer hacking scandal is the least interesting aspect of the episode. Even though “Hostile Takeover” likely references the smarmy board members trying to take Cat’s company away from her, the real hostile takeover that matters is Astra’s plan for Earth. And she isn’t alone. Along the way we learn that Astra is actually married to Non. Though he isn’t the mute brute we remember from Superman II.

Speaking of Alura, Kara has a flashback to Krypton where we learn that she and Astra were actually very close. In fact, they had a secret decoder ring that they used to communicate with one another. Astra tells tween Kara that “Krypton is dying” and that she isn’t a bad person for doing what she’s done. Apparently, Astra was an eco-terrorist on Krypton. Why she didn’t just consult with Jor-El (who was similarly outcast for telling everyone Krypton was doomed) is a question to be asked later, I suppose.

Back at CatCo, the Super Friends are still trying to get to the bottom of the hacking scandal when news reports show a woman hovering over the skies of National City. Auntie Astra is calling out Supergirl!

Remember that this is a television show. Even though they’re on a major network like CBS, to expect a super powered flight in mid-air would be overdoing it. But guess what? They deliver!

Seriously, this is some movie level shit. Back in the days of Smallville, just seeing Clark take to the skies or do anything remotely Superman was not only a rarity, but a once-per-season type deal. Now, they’re giving us effects that are on par with Man of Steel. Just look.

Eventually, Kara gets the upper hand and subdues Astra. She pummels her while she’s down and comes thisclose to pulling a General Zod on her but finally backs off, and the DEO bring Astra into custody. While there, we learn that Astra basically allowed herself to be captured, and the DEO can’t figure out why. Even Hank is unable to get answers because Kryptonians are immune to Martian telepathy. And it’s still awesome that Hank is J’onn.

When Kara confronts Astra in her cell, her aunt tells her that Alura is the one to blame for everything that has gone wrong. She even blames her sister for using Kara to catch her while on Krypton. Kara is interrogating the hologram of her mother and is furious that she was being used. When the computer program is unable to answer her questions, Kara unleashes the full power of her heat vision at it in what is probably the most emotional moment of the series thus far.

This revelation destroys Kara and she is unable to focus when she’s around her “normal” friends. Though the Super Friends finally find evidence to finger one of Cat’s board rivals for the hacking, the victory is little comfort to Kara. Later, Cat invites Kara on to the balcony because she has some questions. The biggest one: is Kara Supergirl?

It’s a perfect scene and sends Cat and Kara’s relationship into some awesomely uncharted waters. Frankly, I’m glad Cat was not only let in on the secret, but that she actively figured it out on her own. Once an investigative journalist…

Sadly, Kara has little time to process this because at that moment, Astra and the Kryptonians’ plans are revealed. They attack Lord Technologies because Max has developed an anti-Supergirl, aka anti-Kryptonian, weapon. The DEO arrive on scene and battle with the evil Kryptonians. Henshaw gets to unleash a little Manhunter too.

Supergirl finally arrives but too much damage has been done. Still, she sees her evil uncle in the battle and the two fly headfirst into fisticuffs. What happens next? We’ll have to find out in the new year.